Origins

Perhaps I should just clarify something here. In my last post I claimed to have discovered/invented Baubles.
As far as I know, that's true - the name is certainly my creation.
I've never seen anything like them before, and have searched online without finding anything remotely similar. I recently bought a copy of Jinny Beyer's "Patchwork Puzzle Balls", but she only makes a passing reference to embellishment.
A bit surprising really, you'd think someone would have thought of it by now.
So, dear readers, if you know of anyone else doing this, I'd love to hear about it.

There are other, beautiful textile balls called Temari - a traditional Japanese handcraft, you can read about them here.

And the name? Well, if you look up baubles in the dictionary, you find this -
child's toy, plaything; a showy trinket or gewgaw; the baton of the Court fool or jester; a foolish matter; a paltry thing.
Since they are undeniably pretty and fun to play with, and serve no useful purpose that I can think of, Baubles seems an appropriate name.

Jesters carried a mock sceptre, also known as a bauble