Book Review: Bob Ross Cross Stitch

Bob Ross is well known for his leisurely approach to creativity, producing paintings on the fly that might have “mistakes” covered up by happy little trees, or clouds, or just left to be an expression of a happy accident.

Cross-stitch designer Haley Pierson-Cox took Ross’ famous quotes and aesthetic as inspiration for the designs in Bob Ross Cross Stitch, which includes 12 patterns and a kit with supplies to make two of the projects.

The patterns include a lot of text, with phrases like “There is an artist hidden in every single one of us” surrounded by painting supplies or “anything we don’t like, we turn it into a happy little tree” with, of course, trees.

I looked at a PDF copy of this book but it looked like the charts were well-sized and easy to read. This would be a fun book for anyone who likes Bob Ross, or you can stitch up these sweet and colorful projects for your Ross-loving friends. What a great confluence of two great crafts, painting and cross stitch.

Bob Ross Cross Stitch is set to be released Aug. 30, 2022. You can preorder it on Amazon.

About the book: 48 pages, 12 patterns plus cross-stitch materials. Published August 2022 by becker&meyer! books. Suggested retail price $22.99. Publisher’s website.

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How to Fix Mistakes in Cross Stitch

When you put all the time and energy you do into making a great cross stitch project, it’s worth taking the time to frame it in a way that will make it look its best.

Often for smaller designs we’ll choose to frame projects in a hoop, which is cute and a fine option, especially for seasonal projects you might want to change out through the year. Others will send their finished projects for professional framing, which is a great option for gifts and heirloom items that need to be preserved, but it can also be quite expensive.

Crewel Ghoul has a great tutorial for a way that you can easily frame your cross stitch projects at home with just a few supplies.

She uses adhesive mounting board (but you can use non-adhesive board if you have some one hand or you need a size that’s not available in an adhesive version) and a few other basic supplies to secure the sides and corners of the cross stitch fabric around the board before putting the design in the frame.

This requires a bit of hand sewing, but we’re cross stitchers so I’m sure we can handle that.

Framing your cross stitch like this gives it a little padding in the frame, which makes it look better than if it were just flat in a frame with no special finishing. It’s also a great idea to use a frame without glass or to leave the glass out of the frame so it doesn’t crush your stitches.

And though this is super secure it’s not 100 percent permanent if you decide you don’t want the project framed in that way any more. Or you can take it out of the frame and the edges are still all nicely finished so you can display it a different way without having to do anything else to it.

Check out the tutorial at Crewel Ghoul.

[Photo: Crewel Ghoul.]

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