Finish: A Little Pretty

My office does a Secret Admirer swap in February instead of a Secret Santa at Christmas, and the person whose name I drew once said she hoped I'd knit her something someday.  With only a week to get it done, I wasn't sure I could finish a handknit project, so I made a little pincushion/office ornament for her using this tutorial. 

If I'd had more time, I probably would've made a fabric-covered button to match the dark pink background fabric, but was lucky to find a suitable bead/button thingy for the middle in my bead stash. 

I'm making two again, and was happy about how much my folding improved from the first to the second.  

Though I'd intended to put the teal and yellow-green across from each other, I luckily messed it up on the one that wasn't folded as well. 

Bwaaww, little tiny blanket-stitched label!  It's really there to distract from the Frankensteinian whip-stitched turning hole.  Not even invisible thread can help that one, so distraction seemed to be the best way to handle it.  Usually, doing the one I'm keeping first allows me to get all the stupid mistakes out of the way and it's nice to just have a practice run so the second one can be a little better.  Because I didn't have much time left, though, I had to finish this one first, so it could be a bit more polished than it turned out. 

I stuffed this with fabric scraps - piles of thread ends and threads clipped from the edges of fabric after prewashing make the best stuffing.  Leftover wool is really great too, springy and squishy. 

I feel like I'm putting myself out there a bit with this one.  I'm sure the recipient will appear to like it, because my coworkers are almost uniformly lovely, gracious beings, but I hope that she hangs it on her wall and it gives her a little bit of joy to look at every day.  

Linking to Finish it Up Friday at crazymomquilts.  

Happy crafting!