Thimble Pips

I think I’ve developed a bit of a thing for making these cute little thimble pips.  They are quite a bit smaller than the clam shell accessories cases I showed you in this post.

So far I’ve made three while working on the tutorial for how to make them and I’ve got the plastic forms cut out to make 5 more of the smallest one!

These go by so many different names:  thimble buds, precious pods, precious buds, pipkins, clam shells and Kai No Kuchi.  But of all the names I like thimble pip the best because it’s the most fun to say.

The largest is 2.5” and I’ve embroidered the two sides but left the bottom plain.

The pattern for the side with my initials came from this Vintage Embroidery Monday alphabet. The pattern for the back can be found amongst these. I added the ladybugs simply because I love ladybugs.

The stitches I used were backstitch, satin stitch and lazy daisy.  For the gold border I tried a new to me stitch called the coral stitch.  I found the how-to video for it on Mary Corbet’s Needle & Thread.

This large one holds my three thimbles with plenty of room left over.

The redwork thimble pip pictured below on the left is 2” and will hold the three thimbles if I nest them. The pattern for the flower can be found on the same pattern page as the lazy daisy flowers on the 2.5” pip. It can’t be seen in the photo but I embroidered along the joining seams with a herringbone stitch after they were first sewn together using a blind stitch with heavy weight hand quilting thread.

The tiniest of the thimble pips pictured above on the right at only 1.5” is just the right size to hold one thimble. It too had the herringbone stitch worked along the joining seams as well as along each side of the opening.

I hope you’ll come back for the complete tutorial which includes simple instructions for how to create a pattern to make any size of pip you’d like. Watch for that towards the end of next week. By then I should have even more thimble pips to show you.

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