Book Review – Just CrossStitch

Autumn stitching abounds! From framed pieces to pincushions, coasters and more, the 25+ patterns in this issue of Just CrossStitch will have you stitching through the chilly season with your warmest colors. The magazine features patterns for autumn, Thanksgiving and Halloween, so you’ll have projects to last you until Christmastime!

Capture the colors of autumn with the Colorful Leaves Biscornu. Stitch autumn leaves in shades of topaz and red settled delicately among fresh green branches. Use simple stitches—cross stitch and backstitch—to create this elegant design.
Fall feline! The deep, black linen fabric of the Autumn Cat creates a dramatic canvas that’s perfect for the rich autumn colors of terra-cotta, yellow, brown and green. Easy-to-follow finishing instructions will have you completing this feline-shaped project in no time.
Halloween Spooktacular! Stitch 6 spooky ornaments featuring classic black cats, skeletons, ghosts and more. By the end of this issue, you’ll be cackling with joy. Plus, you won’t want to miss our ongoing series features! Pick up Part 2 of the House for a Wife, a Huswif, and continue perfecting your specialty stitches in the Floral Band Sampler, Part 5. All this and more when you download (or subscribe!) today!

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Book Review: Fabulous Florals

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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