Review:Neat Container – Cross-Stitch

Recently I had the chance to check out the Neat Container Storage system, which is part of a Craft Gossip Giveaway. It is a handy storage system that comes with storage bins in a wide range of sizes. The set I tested has eight of the the size #1 (six-inch wide) shoe box pod, eight of the #3 (four-inch wide) accessory pod, and four of the #4 (twelve-inch wide) sweater box pod. There are smaller and larger sizes of the pods available as well.

I certainly can see where they’d be useful for for organizing shoes, sweaters, and accessories, but I plan to use the pods for organizing craft supplies. But, I digress. Let me tell you first about how easy the pods are to set up and use. The pods arrive stacked in sets. They are two-piece and the lids snap in place. The tops are clearly marked, which is nice.

The containers are light-weight, but it is clear that they are durable. I did some smash testing and they stood up well to that. I placed heavy objects in the containers and they held up to the weight just fine – I know they will hold up to my cross stitch stash.

After you put the pods together, you set up a five column system that is demonstrated in a video on the website. It is quite simple and easy – it requires no extra hardware or tools and no special skills or training. I had the Neat Container set up in just a few minutes. What is great is that you can then pull out one of the pods from anywhere in the system, even the bottom, even from the corner, and the tower of pods won’t tumble down.

I think I have found the place to organize all my current works in progress!

Learn more about the Neat Container at neatcontainers.com .

Pricing for the kits range from $35 to $189 depending on how many pods are included.

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15 Ugly Christmas Holiday Sweaters To Cross Stitch

I love the look of variegated cross stitch floss and how it makes it possible to stitch with a variety of colors without changing thread, giving your project more depth and a more complex look without you having to do anything different.

Or at least not much different. I recently came across this blog post from The Copper Fox all about how to use variegated floss and it noted that many people would say it’s a good idea to complete a whole stitch (when you’re stitching whole cross stitches) with the floss before going on to the next stitch. Most of us stitch row by row, but of course if you do that with variegated yarn, it could change color along the way and you’ll end up with stitches that are half one color and half another color or a different shade.

Of course that makes total sense but I’d never thought about it.

The post includes swatches with different kinds of variegated threads to show the different between working stitch by stitch or row by row, and it doesn’t make a huge different over the small area shown but I can see how it might make a difference if you had really long rows or if you just want to make sure your stitches are a single color whenever possible.

In addition to this experiment, the post talks about other ways to work with multicolored floss, including deliberately mixing the colors among the strands of floss you are stitching with and stitching in a different order instead of right to left and top to bottom (or whatever direction you typically work) to get different effects from the thread.

It’s fun to geek out on this stuff because it can make a difference if you want to play with it, or you can just stitch on without giving it much thought, and both will give you good results.

Check out all the experiments at The Copper Fox.

Do you do anything different when you stitch with variegated floss? I’d love to hear about it!

[Photo: The Copper Fox]

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