Maker Inspo: Circular Needle Roll in Quilting Cotton

Like many sewists, I’m also a knitter. For storing my knitting supplies, I have rubbermaids, project bags, tool holders, notions pouches, and a straight needle roll. But somehow, none of these keeps my circular knitting needles organized any better than a jumble in a box. Which is not great, when you are searching for the right needle and not really sure where it is.

One option for circular needle storage is a binder with plastic transparencies. That works, but it’s nearly as pretty as something made from a lovely quilting cotton print (or two). I imagined a roll with a pocket for each size, different prints for the outside and inside, and a cute tie to hold it together. The sewing patterns I found online looked okay, but not exactly what I was looking for. So with optimism and not a huge amount of planning, I decided to wing it.

For the outside, a space print (of course). It’s dark and pretty, and doesn’t show dirt if I drag it around with me. For the inside, the opposite, a pretty pink craft themed print. And for the ribbon, I took the Kylie and the Machine ribbon off my Advent Calendar box. It’s cute and has craft tools printed on it: perfect!

I cut a piece of the inner fabric a little less than half the size of the outer piece, and pressed the edges under all around. Then I sewed the inner fabric to one side of the outer fabric, along the short end and every few inches across the length, to make pockets. I left both long edges open, so the needles could be accessed from either side.

Then I folded the outer fabric in half, wrong sides together, and sewed it to make the outside. On both long ends and one short end, I left a couple inches of extra outer fabric to make flaps to keep everything from falling out. A topstitch row just a millimeter inside the fold keeps the flaps mostly in place.