Project Recap [Christmas tree ornament]

To try out something a little different, I ordered a kit with one of my online cross stitch orders some time ago. The stitching has been completed for a while, but I finally added the French knots and did the final cutting out of my Christmas tree ornament. Designed by Susan Winget for Dimensions, the kit came with 14 count plastic canvas, cotton thread, a needle, and the pattern. The floss arrived sorted and labeled on a cardboard organizer, which wasn’t absolutely necessary for this kit, but is nice to have. Symbols were chosen well and easy enough to distinguish from each other. Additionally, the paper pattern uses two colors, black and pink, which helps to further differentiate some of the symbols. The type of stitch and number of strands were clearly tabulated and overall it feels like a professionally put together pattern. Also included were brief stitching instructions, but I didn’t use them so I can’t comment on how effective those were.

For something that was relatively small (about 4.75” x 3.12” at its tallest and widest points), this project took considerably more time than it would have taken on Aida. While laboring on my tree, I discovered that I strongly dislike stitching on plastic canvas. The holes become very tight after you start stitching and have multiple strands going through each hole, making the needle hard to get through the canvas. Eventually, I stabbed a hole in my finger from pushing the needle through the canvas, though this problem could be solved with a thimble or different stitching technique. I also found it hard to anchor starting and ending threads if I was running them under existing stitches, again because of how tight the stiches were to the canvas. With all that said, the end result looks really, really nice. The backstitching adds definition without being too blocky and the French knots that I considered not doing are needed to bring out the snowflakes. The final product looks good enough that I would even do another project on plastic canvas if it were similarly well-designed. Apologies in advance to my fingers.

The initial cross stitching took about three weeks, then I added the backstitching a couple months later on a trip home, then a couple months ago I spent another two days doing French knots and one more day cutting out the tree and making the ornament hanger. The plastic canvas was surprisingly easy to cut with scissors, but I ended up using a craft knife for most of the little cuts around the tree branches. The back is on the messier side for me, partly because there were more color changes than in some of my larger projects, and partly because I travelled farther than I normally would so I wouldn’t have to start/end another thread. I’m considering trying to back it with felt, but either way it’ll be going up as a Christmas decoration. As I mentioned above, it was a very well put together kit. Worth the pain.