Talk Back Thursday

Thank you so much to Katherine, Sarah, Mary, Claire, VernonFashionStudio, Lynne, Carla, Corrine, Gwen and Mamafitz for talking back to my confession last week! I asked about straight pins and whether or not people preferred specific types.

So, what did people say? I think Carla summarized it best - there's no one right answer, this is a matter of personal choice. And, indeed, there were quite a variety of personal choices expressed in the comments. ;)

Just over half of the commenters have a pin of choice and stick with it. Here are how their votes fell out:

• "standard" straight pins (2)
• small ball point pins with colored heads (easy on the fingers) (1)
• extra-long pins with plastic heads (1)
• IBC glass head pins (1)
• super-fine glass head pins (1)

The rest of the commenters use different pins for different purposes.

For everyday use, people recommended:

• glass head pins, at least 1.5 inches long
• Iris silk pins
• extra-fine glass head pins

For delicate fabrics:

• silk pins (consensus here across several people!)

For knits:

• ball point pins (only 1 person called out this category)

For bulky fabrics:

• long, flower-head quilting pins
• long, glass-headed pins

For quilting:

• long-flower headed quilting pins
• safety pins for quilt sandwiches

For fittings:

• long glass-headed pins

For applique:

• 1/2 inch pins

For fabrics that don't hold a pin well:

• double-pronged pins

Finally, Gwen pointed out that there are non-pin alternatives, such as small clips, for those fabrics that are super-delicate and/or very bulky.

We also got some general advice - but, again, remember that not everyone agrees with all of these suggestions:

• longer pins are better than shorter pins
• glass heads are better than plastic heads (primarily because of ironing, but it was also said that plastic heads are more likely to fall off)
• don't buy cheap pins - they can damage your fabric and won't last as long as quality pins

Sadly, despite all the variety in the answers, no one called out "shrinky dink" headed pins, like those in my photo. Go figure... ;)

Thanks again to everyone who took the time to leave a comment! :)