Needle case project - ideal gift! A tutorial

A while ago, I wrote a post about how to make an easy sewing kit case. As I was writing it, I thought the needle case within it might merit a post, too, but it's taken me a while to get round to it.

Before you dismiss the offering below as like the work of a child - it is the work of a child, namely yours truly age 7 or 8. We were required at school to make these needle cases as a Christmas present for Mummy. That is one reason why this is such a nice project - even a child can do it, and it's a great idea for getting your kids sewing. As long as they can hold a needle without stabbing themselves - they can do it.

In this post, I'll tell you how to make a needle case like this, or, if you or your children don't like this little Dutch Doll design, I have several other suggestions for you.

Let me start by telling you a story about my needle case. I'm left handed, and try as they might, neither my (right-handed) mother nor my (right-handed) teacher could show me how to do the button-hole stitching round the edge of this. We were almost in despair, when my (left-handed) father said - "I can show her!" He and all his Army colleagues during WWll, had to be able to do blanket stitch to repair their woollen blankets. .And he had had to teach himself with the aid of a mirror, since no-one could show him, either. Once my Dad showed me how to use the needle in my left-hand, and sew the opposite way, we got on fine. (Although experienced sewists distinguish between button-hole stitching and blanket stitching, for me they're pretty much the same thing - perhaps for lefties, it's all we can do to thread a needle, let alone care whether the needle goes backwards or forwards.) 

You may see from the inside that it is a bit less than perfect, but, given that this has lasted (and is still in daily use) for over 60 years, I can still recommend the design!

Materials:

• Template (see below)
• Pieces of felt, medium weight - not too thin and fragile, but not thick and bulky either - you or the child needs to be able to hand-sew through two layers at least.
• Some thin wooollen material or flannel (that doesn't fray too much - look at mine above)
• Thick button thread or embroidery silk.
• Scissors
• A needle with a large enough eye for the thread.

Template:

First, you need to start with a template. To be honest, you can design your own, it just needs to have a shape broadly like this:

Basic template

You want a design which is about 6" tall (or c 15cm) with a width towards the bottom of about 4.5" wide (or 11.5 cm).You want the width of the narrowest part (the 'neck') to be about  2 1/2" wide (about 6.25 cm). It doesn't have to be that precise, but you want the bottom part to be wider across than the length of your needles. Here are some ideas, starting with the Dutch Doll:

Dutch Doll and Teddy Bear 

Superhero and Cat  

Puppy and Owl 

Russian Doll and Frog

Don't like any of them? It's easy to design your own, using the Basic template as a starting point for the shape. You could consider other animals, like a monkey or rabbit, or toys, like a wobbly clown or stacking rings; a Christmas tree or snowman; a sandcastle - almost anything you can think of which has a wider bottom than the top.

You can make it as simple or fancy as you like. For a child, I would stick to a simple outline shape, with limited decoration. Most of the above would lend themselves to this. But there's no reason why you can't use the same idea to produce lovely gifts for your family and friends. You'll see, for example, on the frog, I've drawn a bow tie. The puppy could have a collar. The Russian doll could have all sorts of fancy decorations.

How to make a sewing case

First, draw and cut round your template TWICE on your chosen colour/s of felt; one will form the front and one the back. If you want to decorate the front, It's a good plan to cut out any decorations you want now, either from felt or whatever you like. (The advantage of felt is that it doesn't fray.) My original Dutch doll just had a sort of flower at her collar, but you could add features like eyes and a bow tie to the frog, wings to the owl, a different coloured body for the superhero. You should also cut two pieces (three if you want) of the thin wool or flannel, 2/1/4" wide by 3.5" long (5.75 cm x 7.5 cm). If you have pinking shears, you could pink around three sides (the two sides and the bottom) but if your material doesn't fray too much, it will be fine without.

Then do any of the decoration you want to the front. Maybe you want to embroider eyes and a face on the Russian doll, a belt and cuffs on the superhero. Or just attach a simple flower. Mine was attached just with one simple French knot through the blue flower and the green foliage. It's easiest to do this before you put the needle case together. (On my original version, the whole thing including the decoration was sewn in one go - I'll explain that at the end.)

Next, take the back piece and lay it flat on its back. Take your two or three flannel / wool pieces and lay them vertically so that about 1/2" or just over a centimetre is above the 'neckline', the rest laying down the 'body'. Put the front piece right side out on top. Run a few running stitches across the neckline to hold the flannel pieces in position. (See above picture.)

Now, starting at the back of the neck, blanket stitch or button hole stitch all the way round the bottom back (just the SINGLE layer) right up to the neck. Then carry on blanket stitching through BOTH layers, front and back, round the 'head', until you reach the neck again; and finally blanket stitch round the single layer of the bottom front until you join the neck again, and fasten off inside. 

Especially if a child is making this, I suggest quite a large stitch, mine were about 1/4" wide and long. (That's about 0.6 cm.) Now, I'm not the best person to tell you how to do button-hole or blanket stitch if you don't already know (unless you are left-handed). There are lots of tutorials for this on You Tube, but this one is as good as any. If you ARE left-handed, here is an explanation.

I mentioned earlier that mine was sewn all in one go. We knotted our thread behind where the flower would be attached, and attached the flower to the front with a French knot. (Or a couple of stitches would be fine.) Then out through the back of the front piece again, and across the neckline with the running stitches to hold all the pieces together. Then blanket stitch round one bottom, over the double layered top, and round the other bottom. In some ways, this may be easier for a child, as you don't have to finish off and start again. But it needs a long piece of thread, with all the risks of entanglement. 

Finally, you can put some needles in! I used to keep larger ones on one piece of flannel and smaller ones on the other, (and occasionally put a few safety pins through the outer case.) However, I'm not so disciplined now. As you can see, there's currently a muddle of needles and pins stuck through both layers.

This is still a great project for getting children sewing - a marvellous Mothers' Day present.

FOOTNOTE: Since I wrote this post, I have added a little pocket to the inside of the back, to hold a couple of needle threaders. That seems to me to be a useful addition, so I will try and take a photo of it when I'm next downstairs with my phone.