6 Fun Ways to Conquer & Calm Crazed Bobbins

Who isn’t familiar with runaway bobbins? Bobbins trailing ever-lengthening loose threads? Bobbins thrown in drawers to fight it out amongst themselves? Tangles of bobbin tresses that can reduce you to tears? We’re here to show you 6 easy and creative sanity-saving solutions!

A Moat of Bobbins

You can always count on Karen Way, of Sew Many Ways Blog, to come up with cute crafty ideas, and she seems something of a master when it comes to bobbin fixes. Let’s start with her splendid jelly mould: “I love thrift stores, yard sales and consignment shops. You can find so many different things that you can’t find in stores today. When I see something that’s out of the ordinary and cheap, I pick it up and see what I can do with it beyond its intended use. A perfect example of that – vintage mini aluminium ring moulds.

“I usually keep bobbins with their matching spools of thread, so these little pans are great for the bobbins that don’t have matching spools any more. They are also great for separating machine thread, hand sewing thread, quilting thread versus ordinary thread.”

Ring of Confidence 

Another bright idea from Karen Way, of Sew Many Ways, is her key-ring contribution. Like so many top ideas, it’s all the better for its simplicity. Buy any size plain hinged ring from keycutters, hardware stores or office-supply outlets and just thread your bobbins on. Snap closed, and voila! instant bobbin-storage solution.

Bobbin Tamers

This simple and effective idea comes from Becky Jorgensen, from Patchwork Posse, who bought a bunch of small-sized stretchy hairbands to wrap around her bobbins, to prevent them unwinding and tangling. Becky admits that they work best on clear plastic bobbins, so that you can still see the thread colour beneath, but either way, it’s a top idea, we think. Just pull them over the wound bobbin or wrap them around twice if the bobbin is small. And keep plenty of spare ponytail bands in your workroom, so you always have them ready for new spool candidates.

DIY Dowels

Maggie, from Smashed Peas and Carrots, took to the tool shed to make something for her own crafty workroom. And she says it’s the simplest project she’s ever handled – and one of the most useful for her stitch crafting. This wood structure consists of a solid timber base with holes drilled in to accommodate pieces of dowel. The spines of doweling make perfect vertical posts for bobbins. If you’re a little nervous about taking on a drilling and gluing job, Maggie leads you by the hand with her simple tutorial!

Chevron Style

Katie Harris, from Craptastic, also did a spot of toolshedding to create her perfect spool and bobbin storage board. First, she visited a timber supplier to get the base board, then she stained it a walnut colour suit her workroom. She was originally going to frame the whole board but decided to paint a frame-lookalike around the edges, instead. And while she had that blue masking tape out, she painstakingly drafted out her taped chevron pattern. The blue painters’ tape masked off the chevron pattern, so Katie could then just paint in white to get her zigzag effect before peeling off the tape. To get a lovely distressed look, she then sanded the whole board before hammering in strategically placed nails to hold her spools.

Posy Pairings

Par excellence … using decorated golf tees to secure matching bobbin and thread spool. It’s another idea from Karen Way, of Sew Many Ways, who plucked the heads off some silk flowers and hot-glued them to the top of golf tees before using the tees to unite reels and bobbins.