The Running Stitch and I

The running stitch and I are not friends. Indeed, we are old acquaintances, but we will never be close. I have this impression in my head of what size, spacing, and evenness I should be able to achieve with the running stitch, but it never works out. Sorry running stitch, we just weren't meant to be.

I think my issue is precisely because I have a predetermined vision of stitches in my head that are too small and closely spaced for the mechanics of stitch to actually work when I am sewing through two layers of felt and 4 layers of fabric. Or a quilt. Or pretty much anything except a single layer (and how often does that happen???).

This angst has been brought on by the fact that I finished up my scissor cozy. I'm actually really happy with it! I even taught myself a new embroidery stitch for the stem (the threaded herringbone for the curious). I love the way it turned out with sloping curves rather than sharp points, and the extra dimension it adds to the pattern I drew up is great.

The button is a find out of my random bags o' buttons from Britex; it matched the lining fabric nicely and is simple enough it doesn't detract from the design on the front. I also purposefully kept the string closure simple. I might change my mind and add on a new one with some more personality later, but for now I like that it isn't really noticeable. 

The scissors fit in it nicely with an extra pocket to keep them from slipping out while in my project bags. There certainly are places to poke needles into should the need arise, so I guess one could still call this a needlebook as the pattern was intended. I thought about putting an extra pocket on the left side but nixed that idea in favor of a larger area of the pretty lining to view. I wasn't really sure what I'd use it for, anyway. I think my knitting stitch markers are going to live in the left pocket, though! Now I can stop misplacing them. 

Back to my running stitch issues. The stitches around the border and up the spine are, obviously, running. But I didn't sew them in the usual rocking motion/loading multiple stitches on the needle way. Instead, being the overly meticulous person I am, I stitched each one individually to keep them even. That's kind of cheating. And slow. And this is what usually happens when I use this stitch. That or I give up and use the sewing machine instead. I really do have high hopes that by the end of this class I will feel more reconciled with doing this stitch the right way, but I was pulling out way too many stitches for this to be relaxing this time. Maybe with a project that has thinner layers....