Blog Hop #16, Missing Needles

I just knew there was something I was forgetting to check on or do, but what was it and what day was I supposed to do this forgotten something???  My answer was found while I was reading through the blogs that I follow this morning.  My answer…I was going to start participating in the blog hop from Stitching the Night Away.  On the 1^st & 15^th of each month, a question is posed and if you choose to follow the blog hog, you post the question, their link, and your answer on your blog.  Easy enough, that is if you can remember.  So just 8 days late here goes my blog hop post, which is actually #16. 

The blogging prompt for hop #16 is:

How many needles have you lost? Feel free to estimate. Tell us your best “lost needle” story

Goodness, I don’t think I have kept track how many needles that I have lost in the 30+ years that I have been cross stitching.  I do know that seven years ago I started keeping track of my needles much better.  So here is the best or if you ask my husband the worst lost needle story I have. 

Over the years, I have become a multiple needle stitcher.  I started by parking my needle and the floss in my fabric away from the area I was stitching on.  When the extra tails intertwined in my current stitches, the needles and floss had to go somewhere else.  If I were stitching away from home, I would just use my shirt to put the extra needles and floss, so no big problem there.  At home I found that the right armrest of the recliner made quite a nice pincushion and the floss could hang down and not get tangled in my project.  Then I started to park needles in both spots when I was at home. 

That was until one evening my husband started hopping on one foot and using some very colorful words.  I figured it was one of my sewing pins but when he checked his foot it was one of my cross stitch needles that I had no idea was missing.  The day after the needling stabbing my husband gave me one of his extra mechanic magnets from his toolbox.  So now any time that I think that I have dropped or misplaced one of my needles a mini-panic attack happens in our house.  The craziest thing is that 9 times out of 10, the needle is either in my shirt or in a corner of my project or if I am doing hand work on a quilt it is in the quilt.  I have also started using the magnetic needle holders and developed a felt needle parking station. 

Another safety measure I have adapted was after hearing about sanitation works being poked with pins or needles, I have started to placing all of my sharps in a container with a lid and before it goes in the trash I tape the lid down and mark it sharps.  I recently noticed that one of the quilting catalogs is selling special containers to place sharps in before throwing them in the trash.  I think old prescription bottles with the labels taken off work just as well.

Happy Stitching!!!

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