 thimbles. And as Garment Sewers I know that you guys know by now that every single body is different. We talk about forward shoulders. We talk about having one shoulder higher than the other. We talk about bus cups and different shapes of bodies whether you're a pear or an apple or you know whatever other kind of fruit there is. But did you know that even our little fingers are all shaped differently as well? And due to the shape of our finger whether it's a long finger or short finger whether you're the tip of your finger is tapered or not whether or not you like to cape long fingernails or whether or not you prefer short fingernails. And all of those things impact how you use a thimble. Do you push the needle through the fabric with the tip of your finger or do you do it on the side? Do you do it on the pad of your finger? The shape of your finger kind of determines where you push the needle through and where you push the needle through determines what style of thimble you need. Did you even know that there were different styles? Well there are. Working with Jan who is the owner and artist behind thimbles for you. I showed you the one that I got from her here recently just gorgeous. It's literally art in addition to being very very functional. And in working with her I have learned that the style of thimble you use really matters. Those little bucket thimbles that you get in like basic sewing kits not only don't fit most people just like when we go out to the store and we look for ready to wear something or another and it doesn't fit us. Not only do those things not fit well because they don't fit well guess what they don't work really well either. So she designs four different styles of thimbles. She sent me samples of all of them so I could show you them today and kind of show you how they work what kind of jobs they're best for and that can help you narrow down which style of thimble is best for you. Alright would you check out this collection of thimbles Jan has sent me so that I could help illustrate some of the points that I am trying to make today. But this will give you a good idea too of all the different designs that she has. She has a whole bunch of new ones coming out for spring. There's the Easter Bunny one that she mentioned. There's a frog prince one. How cute is that? And there's also a peacock. So she's got a lot of really great stuff coming your way but so so so so great the work on these. Right? So intricate so beautiful and it's done you know 360 all the way around. Love it love it love it. Okay but about the styles of thimbles. So the first one that you probably recognize is the bucket thimble and I don't have any examples of these here. Jan said that they were the like least popular. No one's really using those they look like this but they have a top on it. So the sort of progression of the bucket thimble is something called the tailors thimble and like I said it looks a lot like a bucket thimble but the top is completely open you can completely see through that. None of these are my size I don't think so they might not fit me exactly how they're supposed to. You can tell I have a bit of a fat finger and this one's a lot more tapered you can see how tapered that is. She has some that are more tapered than others so she would definitely be able to find something that fit you but nonetheless you can get an idea of how the tailors thimble works and as the name suggests it's best for garment sewers. Very few garment sewers use the tip of their finger for the thimble mostly they're using the back side or even the side of their finger for where they press the needle through and then the open top there's actually a reason behind it the top is open so that you can still like use your finger to help like move pins around or if you need to like you know get your tailors chalk out or something like that you can still use your finger again this one's too small for me but if you can imagine the tip of your finger sticking out of this then you can see how you would still be able to use your fingers natural grip to grip pins or you know other materials that you need to use in the tailoring process. How cute is this little bee? I am obsessed with bees right now as you know from sweet little honey but yeah so that is the tailor's thimble open on top like I said gear toward garment sewists people who do somewhat lightweight needlework they're not going through layers and layers like you would on a quilt or anything like that typically light work on the tailors thimble. Okay next up are these guys and these are called Yukinobi bands and they originated in Japan they were originally made out of like cardstock and then like strands of thread basically were wrapped around them over and over and over again until it both created a design but also made it super super thick and and hard so that you could you know use it to push the needle through. Nowadays they mostly use silver now because it can be fitted really well as you can imagine using cardstock as your base it would be a little bit hard to get a good fit. The Yukinobi bands again are for really really lightweight work you're not going to be pushing these through lots and lots of layers of fabric and as you can see by their design it's for people who really only use the sides of their fingers or maybe even the back if you use any part of your finger the top part of your finger to push the needle through then the Yukinobi bands are not going to be for you but these are also very like not cumbersome like some of the other thimbles maybe where you feel like you know you've got this foreign object on your finger these almost feel obviously like a ring which I think is a little bit more you know user-friendly a little bit more beginner friendly so if you use the sides of your fingers for your needlework highly recommend checking out one of these bands I think that you'll really really like them and I mean come on so pretty right. One of the things I love about Jan's philosophy with thimbles is that she doesn't try and change the way you naturally use needles. Some people will say well you know all I've got are these Taylor's thimbles and if you use the tip of your finger you know you should really not do that maybe try and learn how to use the side or back of your finger and changing the way that people like naturally want to handle a needle and thread. Jan says no that's not necessarily true which is why she provides many different options for different types of needle workers for people who use you know different areas of their fingers she doesn't try and change you she just you know makes the thimbles to fit you and your needs and however you use the the needle which I think is really great. Alright next up we have something called the open nail this is the most common at this point this is the one that I chose you guys have seen it before it's my little dragonfly one and it's really great because as you can see I've got nails and so my nail will extend past this little lip here and it will never ever get in the way. It's also great for people who use the tips of their fingers as well as the side or back you know it's really kind of a universal type of thimble. It's also really great for heavy duty work this one is definitely too small but heavy duty work it is going to stand up to layers and layers and layers of fabric and batting and you know whatever else that you are working on how cute is the owl she's got a ton of designs of the open nail she's even got these like kind of gothic ones which I think are really really cool and again she's gonna help you get these fitted none of these really fit me but she'll help you get it fitted so that it works best for you but some people let me see if I can find one in here some people like a really long one like mine comes down past my past my first knuckle as you can see and there are some in here that are even that are like super short something like this that doesn't even come close to your first knuckle so if you have arthritis or if you have like inflammation in your joints or anything like that she's got an open nimble open nail thimble for you to these butterfly ones are really really sweet so if you need something shorter she's got you if you like it longer she's got you to she's also got these open nail ones that have like a ridge on the top and that is for those of you doing that heavy heavy duty work and you really need your needle to catch into something that is what this is gonna do no slipping or anything like that as you're pushing through really really heavy stuff so oh the little bouquet so adorable she just has you know really really sweet designs here's another little itty bitty one with a little heart so you can see how short that is but if you're using this part of your finger or the side down here to push your needle through then this one wouldn't work for you so you can kind of get an idea by seeing a whole bunch of these on me just sort of how did I mean there are different styles and the styles are kind of similar but within each style there's also different nuances to and Jan being the expert that she is would be able to help you navigate all these choices and find the one that is best for you the one that you were absolutely gonna love the one that is gonna be the most comfortable for you and the one that you're gonna you know be able to get the most best quality work out of honestly so there you have it a lot of information but hopefully helpful information if you were someone that does not use a thimble currently because you can't use those cheap bucket ones and you're getting sores on your fingers or if you do use the bucket ones but find them very very uncomfortable you need to talk with Jan and you need to get fitted for a thimble the way her process works is she'll have you send a series of pictures with like little measurements that she asked for very simple very easy to do she'll ask you a few questions about the type of sewing that you do if you've got a boo-boo on your finger where is it because that'll help her know like where you push the needle through on your finger and a few other questions but once you answer that she'll send you like half a dozen or so to try on her thimbles come in different sizes for a reason so she'll kind of have an idea of what size you are but different sizes fit differently depending on whether your fingers tapered or not or if you have a fingernail and all of that kind of stuff so she'll send you a few options you keep the one you like send everything else back and that's how her process works so if you're interested in starting all of that if you're interested in learning more about Jan and thimbles for you check the link in the description box it's going to take you to her website it's a really great website there's lots of information there too in addition to what I explained today um and you get to find a thimble that actually really is comfortable I know mind blowing and in addition to that it's also really beautiful I mean her silversmith work is incredible so hopefully you'll go check them out check the description box but that is going to do it for me today thank you all so much for watching I'll see you very soon bye