Last Sunday I wrote a post about appreciating our hands. In the posted comments there were a lot of great ideas for taking care of your skin - lotions, creams, and home made recipes. Thank you for sharing your ideas and helpful tips.
Part of loving something (someone) is protecting it (them) from harm. As quilters, we need to take this seriously because a lot of harm can come to our most precious instruments - our hands. Exhibit A can be seen over at The Cozy (but bleeding) Quilter. Poor Gail... no slow stitching for you for a while! Injuries can happen so quickly with a sharp instrument like a rotary cutter. But injuries can also slowly occur over time for us hand stitchers.
We need these to protect our fingers/thumbs as we stitch by hand using quilting aids such as thimbles. Here is an interesting photo I took a few years ago of the hands of my quilting friends at retreat. What a wide variety of favourite thimbles they had. The healthier your skin is and the less injuries you have, the longer your hands will stitch for you. Here is a great link to some hand exercises that might help your stitching dexterity - 10 ways to exercise your fingers and hands. Take good care of your hands my friends!
Funny that this week I was thinking about protecting hands while stitching oven mitts, which protect hands from burns! I finished hand stitching the binding on the mitts ,and today I will be sewing on a loop to hang them up. And then I will be back to hand quilting my Journey quilt. I am on the last block now!
What are you hands sewing this week? Link up your hand stitching project below and share any tips you have for how you care for your hands.
21 comments:
I have finished mums bag. What a relief. Hope she likes it
I can quilt with a thimble but can't sew with one. Been building up a nice middle finger callous from stabbing it during applique. Tried using a bandaid / awkward. Ordered something called thimble it ...little plastic pads to put there and so far they drive me as crazy as the bandaid...ugh! :)
I use a Nimble Thimble ... with surgical tape wrapped around my finger to help the thimble fit (a small is too small and medium is too big) and with Thimble Its underneath to stretch its useful life. I've tried other, "better" thimbles, but this works for me. A little unorthodox, but like I said, it works for me. That's one of the things I love most about quilting ... there's no right way to do anything, just the way that works for each quilter. ;-)
I quilt with the aunt becky, to protect my fingers from being poked. It also uses less repetitive motion to quilt this way. Thanks for the link to the finger exercises. Looks like six more weeks of winter, so a lot of hand quilting weather ahead.
Great post! I guess my hands have been subjected to a lot of hurts -- burns, needle pokes and the occasional rotary cutter wound. Yikes! Love the thimbles picture -- I love hand pictures, especially when they include hands from different generations! :)
Great post! I have switched to using a hoop now but still no thimble for me. I probably don't hand stitch or quilt 'correctly' but hey, that is what happens when you are self taught. I'm having fun and my fingers don't hurt so I'll continue as I am =). Those hexie flowers are going quick, need to prep some more already.
This is how I protect my hands, http://missyscakesandaprons.blogspot.com/2011/04/best-stuff-for-your-hands.html it did not have anything to do with stitching, so I thought I would give you the post here.
I am right handed and I wear my thimble on my right hand. In your photo it looks like there are quite a few lefties or maybe they put the thimble on their left hands just to pose?
I can't quilt with a regular thimble but use a "hand held thimble" instead - it is ergonomic http://karensquilting.com/blog/2012/08/thimbles-2/ at the bottom of that page is a link to where they can be ordered. I also use stick on the finger tip leather or metal thimbles.
I am not really diligent about wearing a thimble when I sew, but with all the cold weather I have made a real effort to always wear my gloves when I go out. It makes a difference!
I am ever so grateful to a sewing teacher in the 10th grade who insisted we learn to sew with thimbles. My favorite ones are some antiques I've collected over the years.
Great wisdom for us quilters Kathy! We take so much for granted!!!
I don't know how to sew with Thimbles. As hard as I'd tried. No success. Maybe I need to persevere more and more. Thanks for the link to the 12 exercices for hands and fingers. Have a blessed week. Hugs
Our hands are our world ...you bet!My hands are not bad but my nails are terrible. I have peeled and broken them and it makes it hard to handle pins and needles!I prefer any thimble that doesn't fit too tight but still protects and has the indent on the top so the needles doesn't slip.Happy slow stitching day!
Finally found a thimble I can use. Funny, I blogged about thimbles today and all the ones I have tried.
I notice a few ladies had the thimble on a finger other than middle.
I do have a callous on my middle finger that has been built up over the years from doing embroidery w/o a thimble but the fine needle for handquilting would push right through the callous and really hurt!
I use different thimbles for different types of projects. For applique, I sometimes like to use the stick-on kind. And the truth is, sometimes those cheap leather ones are the best. I get 3 or 4 of them at a time. When they stretch out I just toss them.
Thanks for the link to the hand exercises! My right hand has been bothering me all day. I think I overdid the rotary cutting yesterday, plus the weather is damp and rainy today. Hand exercises will be a great habit to start.
I do have a good thimble and try to replace it regularly.:) Good reminder!
I did a little hand sewn hexies sewing today so I finally got to link up! :)
Very nice thimbles on hands picture! Enjoy your new oven mitts! I'm just starting to force myself to use a leather thimble pad on my right middle finger while piecing hexies, surprisingly I'm getting use to it. Tried regular thimbles but don't like them, my finger gets all sweaty, yuck. I've never had the need for a thimble when doing hand embroidery.
You are so right about keeping care of your hands. I took the pad off my left index finger last winter with a knife (cutting carrots.. Missed the carrot) and I still get issues with feeling things with it.. Thankfully it hasn't affected my stitching :-)
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