With the big project finished, I embarked on something smaller a month ago…but I put it on hold. Now I’m at it again.
The grid is one square off on one column so the whole thing is off. Any better ways to make an accurate grid? I know pre-gridded is a thing but I have a couple of meters of that plain 14ct fabric that I want to use up.
How has your week been, did you work on anything exciting?
Honestly I’ve never gridded before so can’t help you there, but hopefully someone has some tips! Looks like a much less involved pattern this time round, that must be a nice break. My guess is some kind of llama pattern?
Anyway, I’m breaking with tradition today. No cross stitch whatever from me all week. BUT, in the spirit of Halloween I decided to face my great crafting fear, and am trying my first ever hand embroidery piece!
So far it’s a bit wonky and also my fingers really hurt, but I’m very proud of sticking with it! This is for a video so I’m not posting it anywhere else cos it’s secret. But you won’t tell anyone, right? 🤫
This is really good! I never would’ve guessed it was your first time. Satin stitch can be a real pain and yours looks really nice.
Thank you! I figured out the knack of sort of waggling the needle under each stitch to help them lay down flat, but actually getting them to go where I want to is still an exercise in frustration half the time. Just takes practice, I suppose!
Oh wow this is beautiful! I should try embroidery too. It seems really practical and I want to customise my clothes. Looking forward to the video! That’s a nice teaser.
My guess is some kind of llama pattern?
It’s a really good guess. That’s an alpaca. I’m surprised people figured it out at this stage. It’s an adorable pattern that got me started with cross stitching…but I didn’t start it until now because I was intimidated by backstitching.
Woohoo! Nailed it! There’s a little toy alpaca in front of me now wearing one of those colourful blanket things, and I guess it was 50/50 alpaca/llama from there 😆
Please don’t feel like I’m shilling videos btw, it’s just often my only time for crafts in a given week overlaps with that stuff so it’s just naturally what I talk about. Anyway if you do try embroidery I can say, make sure your needle is big enough to pull all the strands through comfortably because OW MY FINGERS. That’s my #1 tip so far lol.
I’m finally finishing up this Wonder Woman pattern! The logo has proved to be more difficult than the rest of the pattern but it’s been really fun to work on. Hopefully by this weekend I’ll be able to post the finished piece!
I wish I had some advice for you on gridding, but I’ve never tried it. I might look in to it soon since I have some much more complicated patterns I want to work on next
That’s so cool! Is the pattern self-drafted or did you get it from somewhere?
It’s a pattern I bought on Etsy. I have some patterns I’ve made using Floss Cross that I’m working up the courage to try next lol
Looking great! So close to being able to show off the whole thing all together 😀
What’s been difficult about the lettering? Is it just the counting and potential for mistakes there, or something else?
It’s the spacing (which I already messed up a little, but it still looks ok) and just putting in all those thin little lines in the gaps between the other colors. I’ll getting more used to it now that I’m almost done lol that will just make it easier on the next project though!
Ah, yeah it can be tricky with words because if the spacing is off by a stitch it’s sometimes way more obvious to our eyes and less easily fudged. But looks like you have it all under control!
That’s exactly what happened here! I got all of the yellow and most of the black done before I realized two of the letters on the bottom row were off by one stitch! There’s just enough room there that it still works thankfully because I really didn’t want to rip out all of that and start over lol
Suggestions for accurate gridding:
If you have access to a 3d printer, you can print these gridding rulers, which have made my life way easier since I discovered them.
If you don’t have access to a 3d printer, you could cut a small scrap of aida in the same count as your working fabric and essentially create a ruler for yourself. You’d still have to manually count out and mark the ruler, but you’d only have to do it once. Then you can just transfer the lines to your working fabric each time you start a new project.
Note that there is some variance in sizing, stretchiness, and whatnot between fabrics though, even if they’re all the same count. So you may still want to do a quick double check against the ruler before gridding the entire fabric.
Still alive. Slow progress. The last few weeks have not been terribly kind. But still working on it. Hoping to get back to a little more regular progress soon.
Hey progress is progress, it’s not a race!
