What a beauty...

This is my new pincushion. Isn't she perfect? 

I was just a little thrilled when I received my swap package on late Friday afternoon and saw the sender's address: the textured leaf. Wendy's blog drew me in a little while back with her beautiful op-shop-chic, and the pincushion she has made for me - yes, for ME, hurrah!! - is sublime. (You can find some more detailed pictures on her blog here) .

My pincushion has already been employed this weekend, distracting me with its gorgeousness - oh, and doing a fine job of holding pins of course - while I've been sewing up a little stash of coffee-sack 'clutter buckets' for swaps and gifts.

I love that this pincushion has a pleasingly functional chunkiness, meaning that I'm no longer being lacerated the long pins which used to poke through the bottom of my last one.

 However, it is a triumph of function AND beauty, which is important in my flat as I basically make my sewing notions earn their keep as objets d'art among the books, in our dining/lounge/sewing/living/room: 

Thanks Wendy.

Thanks Kate.

I hope my pincushion (sent a few weeks ago) is received with as much enthusiasm - but if not, oh well, I got my dream version!!!

Pincushion dilemmas

My name is Gina, and I have Creative Attention Deficit Dissorder. 

After signing up to Kate's pincushion swap and getting my creative brief, I made up my mind to do some English paper piecing with tiny precious scraps.

And, according to plan, my Cookie Hexagons are coming along very nicely:

But then, last night, after a few hours of creative playing with gingham and coffee sacks (for an upcoming giveaway) I cobbled THIS together from my scraps:

Now, I love this pincushion. I love the textured hessian, I love the colours, I love the chunky feel (it's quilted as well as stuffed), and I love the text.

I also love that it's finished.

Do I:

a) Accept that I am prone to changing my design ideas mid-stream, rejoice that I've finished something, send it to my pincushion recipient, and stick the Cookie Hex on a skirt?
b) Persist with my original hexagon pincushion idea so that I feel like I have some ability to follow through, and keep this one for myself?!
c) Pretend that it was all part of the plan to make another pincushion for my upcoming 'blogversary' giveaway,  send it off to one of you guys, and get on with my Cookie Hex?

Over to you...

Putting a hex on your pincushion

No, I'm not referring back to this brilliant act of crafty voodoo. I'm playing with some hexagons for Kate's mammoth pincushion swap.

I have so many ideas in my head for making a little pincushion... As usual I'm jumping in without a clear design, but after checking out the 'creative vibe' of my (to-remain-anonymous) swap partner, these last precious scraps of Aunty Cookie are speaking to me:

I've played with hexagon paper piecing before and hope to do a fair bit more, so I treated myself to a little product which might just cut out my least favourite part, the initial shape basting. 

Now I just need to think about size, shape, design, filling and so forth, and I'll be able to get making!

Everything other craft project I have on the go is turning out to be a bit of a slow burn, so my intention is to make this one a project of the more short-and-sweet variety.

So please, no hexing my pincushion, ok?