Once upon a time (it was actually just the other day!), I found myself in a situation. A dilemma. A quandary, even.

I was in need of a small embroidered demonstration piece – just a tiny embroidered circle, to illustrate that pendant chain stitch (video coming up later this week) can be worked very effectively around a circle. And my need was exacerbated by the fact that I wasn’t in a stitching situation. I didn’t have a choice of supplies at hand – nothing at all like the supplies I had in mind for my little circle.

But golly, all I needed was a little circle! Just ten minutes of stitching, and I could have the thing done. Add that to the fact that I was sitting, and waiting, and sitting and waiting… in one of those “sitting and waiting” Circumstances of Life. My mind kept wandering back to the pendant chain stitch around a small circle, and in my head, I was stitching it.

It so happened that I had a small selection of stitching supplies on hand. They weren’t gathered together for any project. They were odds and ends that I was transporting to share with someone else. They were there. They were in the car! I could use them, couldn’t I?

Necessity is the mother of invention, to be cliché-ish, and surely this was the case. In my pen case from school, I had a black pen and a broken protractor. In the odds and ends bag in the car, I had a piece of turquoise felt (oh my) and the new colors of floche that I was taking to show my students. Oh double-my. Not exactly my color combinations in regular circumstances.

But I doubted I had a needle.

Oh bother! Really, there are some things that can be accomplished, stitching-wise, without tools. Threads can be cut without scissors. Fabric can be held taut without a hoop. Projects can be seen without ideal lighting. We all know this. We’ve all stitched with bare necessities before. But to stitch without a needle? I wasn’t quite sure how to meet that challenge.

Now, I would love to be able to tell you that I met the challenge – that I managed some MacGyver-type heroics and rigged a needle out of the most unlikely materials and stitched the pendant chain circle and more besides!

But I think I’ll stick a bit closer to reality.

There’s nothing I find more irritating than coming across a Surprise Needle stuck in a piece of fabric. You grab the corner, and —- arrrrgh. Right in the hand.

But you know, sometimes the prick of a needle can be a welcomed thing.

I did get the pendant chain circle stitched (and more besides), and though the piece is not much more than embroidered chaos, I was happy!

It’s time to buy a new protractor.