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.

Project Recap [Singapore]

At some point during the summer, we made a multiple trip[s] to craft stores to pick up cross stitch and framing supplies. On one of those trips, I picked up the floss for a dragon project still to come for a Cornell friend and while I was at it, the floss for this project of landmarks in Singapore. The concept is based on the designer Satsuma Street’s “Pretty Little” cities series, but she doesn’t have Singapore, so my pattern came from Awesome Pattern Studio, who also designed the Acadia pattern I did last year.

Similarly to the Acadia pattern, this one was provided as a pdf in several different versions. I like using the version with the symbols in the color of the floss. The only drawback is that it becomes difficult to see the symbol with very light colors, but you can either zoom way in or check a different version of the pattern. There was one questionable symbol choice, with two triangles that were mirror images of each other being used for two oranges, but there was just enough difference between the darker and lighter orange to make it not too terrible. Otherwise the pattern was clear and easy to follow. It used only full cross stitches, no fractional stitches or backstitching. There were 18 colors, none of which needed more than 1 skein. The color with the most stitches was 550 (very dark violet), with 827 stitches, and the color with the least was 165 (very light moss green) at 120 stitches.

I started the project right after finishing the birth announcement in August and finished in the middle of October for an elapsed time of 53 days. According to the provided stitch count table, there are approximately 6700 stitches, giving an average of about 125 stitches per day. At its tallest and widest, the project measures 114 x 92 stitches, or 8.14” x 6.57” on 14 count fabric. Mine measures 8.13” by 6.31”, so it’s just a little short. Something different I did for this project was to stitch it on 14 count Fiddler’s cloth rather than Aida. Fiddler’s cloth is similar to Aida in its structure, but instead of being 100% cotton, it’s a blend of fibers (some sites say 50% cotton, 42% polyester, and 8% linen), and is supposed to look rustic. I thought it would be interesting to use for this pattern, which is fairly modern, with a lot of bright colors, and I do like how the contrast between the fabric and pattern turned out.

As best as I can tell, the buildings/landmarks featured are the Singapore Flyer, an observation wheel; the Prima Tower, which housed a revolving restaurant on top of a grain tower from 1977 until 2020 (thanks, Covid); the Merlion, Singapore’s lion-headed, fish-bodied mythical mascot; the ArtScience Museum, featuring exhibits that combine art, science, culture, and technology; Marina Bay Sands, the boat/spaceship hotel made (more?) famous by Crazy Rich Asians; and Gardens by the Bay, with its Flower Dome and Cloud Forest conservatories and Supertree Grove. I haven’t been able to identify the rest of the buildings; they mostly look like what skyscrapers tend to look like. With all the different elements and colors in it, this was a fun project to stitch, and whenever I get around to framing basically everything I’ve stitched so far, this one will go up somewhere around the house.

Project Recap [Balloon birth announcement]

Sometime after I moved back to New England, I was digging around in the basement closet when I uncovered a cross stitch kit. I hadn’t stitched anything since February, so I figured I’d give the kit a try, never mind the fact that neither I nor anyone I knew needed a birth announcement. The kit is Simplicity’s Balloon Birth Announcement (05514), featuring a circle of hearts and flowers with balloons, a duck, and two bunnies. It was purchased from the Windsor Button Shop for $4.25, marked down from $8.50. Since the purchase of the kit, Simplicity has been acquired/sold at least twice, and I believe the cross stitch portion of their business is now managed by Dimensions. Windsor Button, if I found the right shop, closed in 2013 after 77 years of business.

The kit contained a 12” square piece of white 14-count Aida, 100% cotton floss in all required colors, a needle, and the paper chart and instructions. The pattern required the more typical full cross stitches and backstitches as well as lazy daisies and French knots. The chart was easy to read, though I still can’t find where/if they marked the number of strands you were supposed to use for any of the stitches. I ended up doing one strand backstitch and lazy daisies and two strand cross stitches and French knots, which worked okay. Some of the lighter colors are a bit light worked with one strand, but I think increasing the strand count would have made it too crowded and the flowers/leaves would have lost definition. They did have instructions for how to do all the stitches, but I ended up looking up YouTube videos for the lazy daisies and French knots just to make sure I was doing them (mostly) correctly.

Additionally, like a decent number of kits, the floss came in a bundle with no labels. This kit doesn’t have too many colors, so they can get away with it, but two of the yellows are very hard to differentiate it you’re not in strong daylight, then the darkest yellow looks orange and the orange is very reddish. Other than that, the quality of the Aida, floss, and needle seemed good. I did make a mistake in centering, so it’s not quite exactly centered, but they provided a 12” x 12” piece of fabric and the pattern is about 8” in diameter so there’s still enough margin on all sides for framing.

I started working near the end of June and finished shortly after the middle of August (June 22-August 19), so it took me just under two months. [I actually finished the cross stitching in about two weeks and it took the rest of the time for all the other stitches, including a solid week of just French knots.] Because of the backstitching/lazy daisies/French knots, there was a lot more stopping/starting threads and travelling across the back than I usually do, However, I did enjoy using/learning stitches other than cross stitches, even the French knots. I might even try an embroidery project sometime. As usual, I substituted double running stitch for the backstitch and I also changed some of the backstitching to make it less blocky. Other than that, I followed the pattern as written, and overall, I thought it was well put together and I like the finished product more than I thought I would, though I still don’t know what I’m going to do with it.

Project Recap [misty mountains]

The latest big project I completed was for no one in particular. I liked the pattern when I saw it, it was on sale, and it didn’t require too many colors, so I ended up picking up the thread for it when I went shopping for the supplies for my previous two projects (the monarch butterfly and sunset lake).

The (untitled) pattern was drafted by ZephyrMood and I purchased it on Etsy. There were ten colors, with only one color needing more than 1 skein if stitching on 14 count aida with two strands. It was a full coverage pattern, all full cross stitches with no backstitching or specialty stitches. Not a whole lot of confetti stitching to speak of, and enough color blocks to mostly work tree by tree at the bottom and by horizontal layers in the mountains.

Fog on mountains and trees

The circular pattern measures 112 x 112 stitches, or 8 inches in diameter on 14 count fabric. My unwashed project measures about 8 1/16” wide and 7 7/8” high, so slightly off like all my other projects, but not noticeably uncircular. Based on the area of a circle, the stitch count is somewhere north of 9800 stitches, though the sum of the given stitch counts for each color in the pattern is 9715. I started right after Christmas and finished a few days after Valentine’s Day, for a total elapsed time of 55 days, an average of ~180 stitches per day, though I didn’t work on the project every day. At this time in real life, it was after I defended, then before/after my final thesis submission, when my brain appreciated taking a break from micelles and margin formatting. I currently don’t have the supplies for my next project, so I’ve turned to the library to start going through Terry Pratchett’s works and RNG-ing my way though a long list of sci-fi and fantasy titles.

This pattern was based on a watercolor work by another Etsy seller, AquarelleSpace. One of the problems with some of the pattern mills that have popped up is that when they make patterns by running photos and artwork through pattern generating software, the resulting patterns can sometimes be not great, with excessive confetti and random colors with two or three stitches in the entire pattern. That was not the case here, and I thought it was a good adaptation of the original watercolor. The only negative was that there’s no stitched model on the Etsy page, so the colors in the mockup don’t exactly match the floss colors in real life, but I still think the finished project turned out well. I worked off the 1 page tablet pdf version of the pattern, with the symbols over colored squares. Symbol choices were reasonable and the pattern was easy enough to read. Overall, a solid pattern, I like the final result, and even the top however many stitches done entirely in 3865 weren’t too bad with a YouTube video or podcast running in the background.

Project Recap [Monarch butterfly]

Next up on the cross stitch project list was a smaller pattern with a short list of colors, another request from a Cornell friend. There were 7 colors total, 2 of which were black (310) and white (blanc) that I already had, and I picked up the remaining 5 colors for this monarch butterfly by Gentle Feather (Etsy) during my Michaels field trip.

Monarch butterfly

I stitched the pattern on 14 count light blue Aida leftover from my turtle and whale. At its widest and tallest, it’s 87 stitches by 61 stitches, or 6.2” x 4.35”. Mine turned out 6.25” wide and 4.25” tall (before washing), so every project I’ve checked has had its dimensions be somewhat off. At this point, I’m not sure if the Aida is very slightly off or if I stitch in a slightly uneven way that distorts the Aida. Anyway, the circumscribing rectangle contains over 5,300 stitches, but the pattern wasn’t full coverage and I’d estimate the actual stitch count to be closer to ~3,500 stitches. Time to completion was about three weeks, for an average of a little over 160 stitches per day, but this was done during my most intensive thesis writing phase so I was stitching less consistently.

Out of all the patterns I’ve done so far, I think this one had the most jumping around between colors and could have benefited from gridding, which I did not do. I completed the black and brown outlines of the wings first and then filled in the rest of the colors from dark to light. I did end up skipping a square on the right wing that I eventually discovered when the wing didn’t meet up correctly with the center section, but I blame that on stitching while simultaneously waiting for/arguing with my internet connection when I was trying to watch Cornell Thanksgiving weekend hockey (I eventually had to give up on the Wi-Fi and go sit next to the router with an ethernet cable plugged in). Because of the symmetry of this pattern, I did go back and do a lot of unstitching and restitching to get the wing outline correct instead of trying to adapt the rest of the pattern to a missing column.

Unfortunately, this pattern was not the most well designed. (Also note that it’s not perfectly symmetrical, but that may not be a major concern to anyone but your friendly neighborhood lepidopterist.) There was no one page version, which is fine since people stitching from electronic devices is a fairly recent development, but the two page version doesn’t have any overlap squares (usually shaded in grey to help transitioning between pages), making it difficult, particularly if you haven’t gridded, to move between pages if you don’t want to cut off your stitching right at the page line. I had printed the black and white version of the pattern to bring along on my Upper Peninsula trip in case I needed something nonelectronic to do, and I ended up taping it together and using it as an additional reference while also consulting a pdf in color.

The color pdf was okay to read, but symbol choices made the black and white version harder to read than it could have been. Although there were only 7 colors, 4 of the symbols were triangles, including right triangles in the bottom right and bottom left corners, one of which could be shaded or unshaded (see the symbol key below), and the two unshaded triangles were often right next to each other. I’ve also heard that darker colors should have symbols with heavier visual weights. This pattern had black as an unshaded diamond and white as a solid triangle. Admittedly, my stitching style caused some of the difficulties with the 2 page pattern, and the symbol problem was mostly solved by using the color version. In the end, I like the final result, and I definitely wouldn’t blacklist this designer or anything else that extreme, but depending on the complexity of the pattern, I might look for other options.

Symbol key

Project Recap [Landscape #68]

After finishing my Acadia project, I took a brief break from cross stitching until I picked my next project and could get supplies. Sometime during the summer I offered to make a few of my friends from Cornell a cross stitch of their choice if they’d like one, and by early fall I had most of the patterns confirmed. Following a field trip to Michaels, I started in on the first project, chosen because it was large enough to keep me busy for awhile and had a not ridiculous number of colors (20).

Landscape #68 (lake and trees at sunset)

Presenting: Landscape #68 (it’s a lake at sunset with silhouetted trees) by 2x2StitchArt, pattern bought from Etsy. At its widest and tallest points, it measures 130x130 stitches, for a total of approximately 13,300 stitches. It took about nine weeks from mid-September to late November to complete, so I averaged a couple hundred stitches a day, even with a trip up north in October and dealing with submitting my second paper, scheduling my dissertation defense, and actually having to write my thesis in November. Like everything else I’ve ever stitched, it’s done on 14 count Aida, again blanket stitched around the edges to stop fraying, which takes some time but works well and is more durable than tape, fray check, or pinking shears. It’s supposed to be 9.3 inches in diameter, but mine ended up 9.3 inches wide and 8.9 inches high pre washing.

I worked off a 1 page PDF meant for tablets/electronic devices with symbols superimposed over squares colored roughly to match the floss color (skein estimates provided separately). The symbols were easy enough to distinguish from each other and the pattern had almost no confetti. Because the pattern had roughly horizontal stripes I stitched it from the bottom up and didn’t have much trouble keeping my place without any sort of gridding. If there’s one thing that was lacking, it’s that the Etsy shop is one of the ones with a large number of patterns and doesn’t have a lot of stitched examples, but I’d seen some other completed patterns from this store on the cross stitch subreddit.  This one did stitch up nicely in the end, with the colors not too far from the mockup. Overall it’s a well done pattern and I’d do another one by this designer.

Project Recap [Acadia National Park]

After a fairly boring winter, I finished my larger cross stitch project of Acadia National Park. If you search for Acadia National Park, one of the images that will likely show up is the overphotographed Bass Harbor Head Light, which is what this pattern is of. More specifically, it’s the Bass Harbor lighthouse at sunset during the summer. Assuming it’s sunset and not sunrise, it has to be summer because 1) there’s no snow and 2) that’s the time of year that the sun sets behind the lighthouse like that.

The designer is Awesome Pattern Studios. With Etsy providing an easy platform for people to sell everything from “live, laugh, love” signs for your kitchen to felted likenesses of your cat made from its own fur, there’s been a huge rise in cross stitch pattern designers. On one hand, this has been a great thing, because you can now stitch a large variety of things, not just flowers, teddy bears, and Bible verses. On the other hand, there are some major problems with trademark/copyright infringement¹, up to and including straight up stealing patterns. Less illegal are pattern mills that churn out large numbers of patterns² that may be of low quality or can be, to put it generously, highly inspired by other designers³. Some people refuse to buy anything from these kinds of shops, others avoid them when possible, and some people don’t know and/or don’t care.

So Awesome Pattern Studios is at least pattern mill adjacent, but it does seem that the patterns were actually made by them (any other similar Acadia patterns I found were also from potential pattern mills). One of the problems with pattern mills is that because of the large volume of patterns, they may just be photos run through a pattern maker and/or haven’t been test stitched, which can lead to problems with the colors appearing different than expected based on computer mockups, random single stitches of colors, or chart symbols that are hard to differentiate (ex. 1 and l). At least for the Acadia pattern, I did not find this to be the case.

It was a full coverage pattern, but was pretty easy to stitch because the colors were in well-defined blocks with hardly any stitches scattered around (also known as “confetti”). There were some questionable single stitches but few enough that it could have been a design choice. Maybe. The pattern had eighteen colors, most of which needed less than 1 skein of floss, with the exceptions of the sky purple, one of the other purples, and one of the peaches. If the pattern’s stitch count was accurate, I managed to get over 6500 stitches out of three skeins of the sky purple. Online calculators seem to say you can get ~1800 stitches out of a skein on 14 count Aida, but I guess the blocks of color and my refusal to carry the thread more than the mathematical minimum distance earned me some extra stitches, which should have saved me about 17 cents.

The finished size is 150 stitches wide and 200 stitches high, or 10.7” by 14.3” on 14 count Aida. I started at the end of January and finished at the end of April (1/30-4/26), so it took 86 days to do 30,000 stitches for an average of about 350 stitches a day. I can usually get a little under 150 stitches done in an hour, but that can drop to ~100 stitches/hour if there’s a lot of counting or color changes or rise to almost 200 stitches/hour if it’s a straightforward section.

Since the project took multiple months, I blanket stitched the outside of the Aida to keep it from fraying, which worked well. I did not grid the fabric, except for running a single thread along the outside of the bottom and right-hand sides to make sure I was going to end up where I was expecting. Because of my current setup, I ended up stitching most of the sky upside down which wasn’t too confusing as long as I stitched in vertical lines. Due to not having convenient access to a printer, I copied the symbol key onto a piece of paper that I kept visible while stitching and referred to the chart on my computer using a version with symbols in the color of the thread. Being able to zoom in was nice, and the colors help to keep you from accidentally stitching the sun in green.

Overall, it was an enjoyable pattern to stitch. Until I can get it framed/need the binder clips and hanger, it’s hanging from the back of my door binder-clipped to a hanger. I’m not sure yet what my next project will be; I have a few ideas but I’m still planning things out to maximize the amount of stitching I can do while minimizing the number of colors of floss I need to buy. Because it’s a scientifically proven fact that even if you have a whole box of floss, the colors you need for your next project will be all the ones you don’t have.

¹I’m not going to get into it here, but fan art can be a very grey area in terms of what’s fair use, what’s parody, what’s okay if you’re not profiting monetarily, etc.

²These differ from collectives that sell work from many different artists/designers with permission, which can be common in eastern European countries.

³For example, see Satsuma Street’s (the original designer) pretty little city series and compare them to the cities made by Awesome Pattern Studio. “How close is too close?” is something else artists have to deal with, like you can’t complain if someone else draws a picture of a house, but would it be considered copying if you both draw a red house with a black roof and three windows?

X Marks the Spot

In my December 2020 summary I mentioned that I bought cross stitch supplies to have something to do during winter that didn’t involve staring at a computer screen. I’d stumbled across the cross stitch subreddit some months ago and thought about getting into it more seriously than I had in the past but didn’t know if I’d be into it enough for it to be worth buying all the supplies. Then I figured I’d basically spent a year only paying rent and buying groceries, gave in, and bought all the supplies. Cross stitching may not be as useful as say, knitting, or woodworking, but it has its advantages. It’s reasonably compact and at the bare minimum, all you need is embroidery floss, fabric to stitch on, a needle, a pair of scissors, and a pattern. You can also buy hoops, frames, and stands to hold the fabric as you stitch; lights, headlamps, and magnifiers to see better; bobbins and cases to organize your floss; thread conditioner; needle minders; and lots of other gadgets, but you don’t absolutely need those things.

I had a pair of scissors from a Walgreens sewing kit, so I ordered floss, fabric, and a pack of needles online (thank you, 21st century). The site I ordered from (123Stitch) looks like it’s stuck in the early 2000s, but they offer fixed rate shipping in the US and fulfill orders quickly. The subreddit also has good things to say about their customer service, though I haven’t had reason to contact them. They ship using USPS, which despite mail volume or staffing delays, has delivered my packages within a week the two times I’ve ordered supplies.

To start out, I decided to try some free patterns from DMC, one of the big embroidery floss manufacturers. My first pattern in about six and a half years was carrots. It was a good project for getting back into cross stitch. Each individual carrot was a few hundred stitches and just four or five colors so they came together pretty quickly. There weren’t a lot of randomly scattered single stitches (confetti) or an excessive number of color changes. The only part that had to be counted a little more carefully was the carrot tops, but even there, unless you severely or frequently miscounted, no one would know if you were off a square once in a while. No half or quarter stitches, just full stitches and backstitch.

Carrots

After the carrots I moved on to a blue whale and a sea turtle. The blue whale used the least number of colors of thread (seven, I think), so had a large patch of a single blue across most of its body. The backstitch in this pattern was a little weird. They asked for the backstitching to be done with three strands (it’s common for backstitch to be one strand), and there were long runs and stitches that ended in the middle of edges or squares, which is fine, just unexpected for an otherwise straightforward beginner-ish project. There was also a French knot for the whale’s eye. I followed a YouTube video and made a knot. Whether it’s a French knot . . . or not . . . I don’t actually know.

Blue whale

The sea turtle was probably the most complicated pattern, and it’s not entirely done because I’m missing a color of floss that was sold out online. It’ll get done eventually. All three patterns are 4-6" in width/height and were stitched on 14-count Aida (the fabric with holes for cross stitching) with two strands of floss except for backstitching. The coverage I’m getting is satisfactory, though you can see gaps with some of the darker colors if you’re very close. I’m now five weeks into a full coverage 30,000-stitch pattern that I picked to keep me occupied for the rest of winter and I’m about a third of the way done, so you can start looking for the big reveal in May at the earliest.

Sea turtle