After yet another quarter-hour or so taken up with searching through my bin of knitting needles looking for a pair of US6s, I thought "Right -- needle rolls." I have a little Martha Washington cabinet of my grandmother's, the kind with three drawers in the middle and two half-round bins at either side -- some years ago I went through all of the loose knitting needles and made cards for the loose ones, with holes and stepped folds and all, but while this was a step in the right direction, it was still a chore to have to pull out a pair grab-bag-like until I found the size I needed. And so in a burst of organizing energy not coincidentally around New Year's, I sewed up a pair of large needle rolls, all out of fabric left over from other projects.
A needle roll isn't a terribly complicated thing, but neither did I feel inclined to reinvent the wheel, as the saying goes, so I spent some time poking around the internet, and then more time narrowing down the myriad of choices ...
The first roll is from a tutorial at Guthrie & Ghani, which with some fiddling makes slots with more depth than just laying two pieces of fabric atop each other and stitching a bunch of lines. This is certainly a handy idea if you have a number of really large needles, but my stitching leaves a bit to be desired, as the slots are clearly of almost-random sizes and depths, and it is more difficult to ensure that the slots are the same depth at top and bottom as well.
I wasn't sure I really needed two pockets, but unlike the lovely needle rolls one sees on Flickr and Pinterest, I don't have a uniform set of needles but a hodgepodge acquired over many years, of surprisingly variable lengths and knob sizes, so as it turned out, two pockets are handy for the shorter pairs.
The second roll is therefore just the two pocket assemblies laid atop each other and stitched down. Since it was clear, once I had laid out all of my needles in a row, that not only do I have a lot, but that I have a penchant for smaller needles (five pairs of nearly-identical 3.25mm!), I realized that having shaped slots in a roll for the finer end of the range would actually be a drawback, since snugger ones would be more secure. QED!
(I vaguely remember that I used a tutorial for the dimensions of the second roll, but have no idea now which one ...)
I had to piece some of the pockets, but all of these seams were easily hidden. I was delighted to be able to accommodate the lining fabric's decorative edge, too --
I still, I confess, need another roll for my dpns, and probably another for crochet hooks -- I have only about four of those, but it wouldn't hurt to have them all in one place, would it! I am getting close to the end of the birds-and-flowers fabric, so we'll see.
The archivist in me was unable to throw away all of the original packaging, so I admit that I have kept some, partly for sentiment -- I'm sure I inherited that set of aluminum Boyes on the left, ca.1970s if not earlier, and the Peace pair (presumably in a project somewhere ...) were bought in Hong Kong -- partly because, well, librarian. The Takumis don't come in that nearly-indestructible green sleeve anymore.
In my wanderings around the internet, I found quite a lot of other interesting projects, as one does, and so yesterday I made a pair of these, the "Brigitte Needles & Notions Zippered Pouch" from a tutorial at VeryShannon. Although I did have some hiccups in the process, I nevertheless managed to make two of these in one day, which is certainly a compliment to the tutorial!
These are fraternal twins, as it were, made from three coordinating fat quarters (anonymous, alas) -- I would certainly have been able to make at least one more pouch, probably two, but I had only two zippers.
I had a bit of trouble with the zipper installation here, which has you stitch around the lining and then around the outer pouch, in two steps -- I couldn't get things to either meet in the middle or line up neatly -- and so ended up going back to the one I used last summer, which has you stitch the two sides in one go, as well as a slightly simpler method of attaching the zipper to the lining.
The next time I make some of these, I would also make the outer-pocket flap a bit longer, maybe just a scant quarter-inch, and also stitch the lining a bit short, as it tends to wrinkle a little inside (because both the outer and the inner are pretty much exactly the same size, and therefore one doesn't fit inside the other quite neatly). These, however, are minor issues, and I'm pleased with the finished pouches!
These look perfect for the job(s) - my problem is putting things back in the right place. This isn't just a knitting needle problem, of course. I get in a hurry and put them on my desk and then there is a pile to be sorted.
I use mostly circulars and DPN's, and have storage 'solutions' for both. They just don't get used in the manner intended!
Posted by: Mary Lou Egan | February 18, 2018 at 06:28 AM
I have a large collection of needles but I tend to use circulars mainly now and they came with their own wallets and the cables I hang on a nail in the wall.
I have three defined collections of straight needles and they have always been in separate boxes/vases.
Posted by: Toffeeapple | February 18, 2018 at 11:05 AM