Could anyone please explain to me what is the purpose or advantage of the flat flower pins over regular straight or safety pins?.

Thank you,
Kathy

I use the flat flower pins whenever I need to hold fabric together securely while cutting with my rotary cutter and ruler. You can put your ruler right down on them and they won't make the ruler go all "wonky" while you're cutting. They really came in handy when I was making my Stack and Whack quilt and I had to pin in many places at once and cut with the pins in place.

I also use them to mark rows. Especially when the rows all look very different from one another and it would be easy to get confused when it came time to sew the rows together. I mark the flower with a number using a permanent pen and place the pin either on my design wall next to the row, or on the row itself up in the left-and corner to keep the rows in their proper order.

they won't melt when hit with the iron either or sink into batting or fleece.

I use the flat pins when foundation paper piecing, as the ruler can lay on the fabric and pins without a problem. Carol Doak, the teacher put me on to this one. Marge

I hate to disagree but some of the flat flower pins you do not want near an iron. My Fons & Porter ones did melt. :( I purchased some at Joanns
that were flat but little buttons for the head that stated they would not melt. I did a test and they didn't melt. So I keep the flat pins in
separate containers and use depending on wether they will be near an iron or not.

Thanks for the heads up regarding the F&P flower pins Freda. It's good to know those things. I just assumed since my flower pins did fine with the iron, they all did. I appreciate the info.

Wow! I didn't realize the benefits of using the flat flower pins! Thanks for enlightening me! I'm going to have to go by JoAnns & pick some up. I hate it when the rulers don't lay down flat when I'm paperpiecing! Thanks for all the good advice!

One more good thing about the flower pins - they don't roll off the table!!! :)

So true reva!

Thank you all for enlightening me on these pins. Sometimes I can't help but get a sneaky feeling some things are just another versions of something else just to get you to spend more money. :(