Lessons in being ladylike

A rainy, cold, appointmentless Sunday seemed destined for craft, and some neglected embroidery took my fancy. This hasn't been bothering me as much as many of my other unfinished projects – possibly because it takes up less space than, say, a knitted jumper and a barrowload of yarn – but it must be one of the oldest unfinished objects I've got.

I started it about 25 years ago and it's a dressing table set consisting of two small doileys and one large – further proof, if any were needed, that I spent a lot of my youth channelling my inner nanna when more age-appropriate activities might have included wearing blue eyeshadow, sporting big hair, drinking Malibu and dancing to Duran Duran. I didn't even have a dressing table back then; I do now, but I also have no desire to gussy it up with embroidery.

I still like the design of violets, though, but I'm aware my taste is a bit suspect, so I showed it to my craft-group friends. They're all much younger and groovier than I am, and they didn't make gagging noises, so it can't be that bad. I decided it could be repurposed, and that one of the smaller doileys might make a fetching pincushion.

Step 1 was to trace around the violets using two glasses; the inner line was to embroider on and the outer one to cut out along.

The idea was to chain stitch around the edge of the two pieces, cut them out then join them together using whip stitch.

This is a technique I learnt about a few years ago when I was editing an embroidery book. I mentally filed it away as possibly being handy in the future, but I'd never actually used it until now – or so I thought. However, when I was making this pincushion I had a sudden flashback to embroidery class at school when I was about seven, and the first thing I ever embroidered; a pincushion whose two circular pieces were joined in just this way. That weirded me out more than slightly. It's craft Groundhog Day again!

For a long time, that pincushion remained my only embroidery project. I didn't like sewing as a child. I was a tomboy, and also apparently an infant feminist. I  disapproved of having to learn to sew; this was about 1970, yet it could have been 1870 or even 1770. Mrs Gilchrist, our sewing teacher, insisted that any thread we used should be no longer than the distance from our fingertips to our elbow; this wasn't so it wouldn't tangle, or to prevent us from stabbing a fellow tot in the eye while flailing about, but because working with long threads wasn't 'ladylike'.

I thought then, and I still think, that no little girl at any stage in history should ever be expected to concern herself with what is and isn't ladylike. I continued to cut my threads as long as I wanted and to get into genteel trouble for it, and once I'd finished that pincushion I didn't pick up a needle again until I was about fifteen. Then I went berserk and was obsessed with embroidery for about ten years. The violet project dates from then.

So, back to the present. Once I'd chain-stitched the inner circle on each piece I cut them both out, leaving a small seam allowance, which I finger-pressed to the wrong side. Next I whip-stitched the two pieces together, remembering to make sure the grain on both ran the same way.

I sewed about three-quarters of the way round, leaving a gap through which I could stuff it. Traditionally pincushions are stuffed with sawdust, but all I had was polyester fibrefill. Despite its small size the pincushion soaked up stuffing at about the same rate as a Romantic poet imbibing opiates.

Once the seams started straining I finished sewing it up then pummelled it about a bit to settle the filling more evenly.

A suitable accessory for a lady.

In retrospect I could have machine-sewed around most of the outside for strength and just whip-stitched the embroidery for show, but it doesn't matter. The whole thing took me a pleasurable couple of hours and I like the result.

What to do with the rest of the dressing table set, though? I think I'll make a little needle case out of the smaller doiley. At the moment I can't think of a possible use for the larger one, and even if I could, I'd have to finish the embroidery first.

Check back here in another 25 years.