Book Review: Mini Cross Stitch Ornaments

There’s nothing cuter than handmade holiday ornaments, and Kooler Design Studio has you covered for ideas with their book Mini Cross Stitch Ornaments.

The book, published by Leisure Arts, has 160 little deigns for just about everything you’d want to use to deck your halls, from snowmen to Santas, stockings and bells, even a Christmas cow.

There’s a series of penguins, a collection of religious designs and images for the 12 days of Christmas.

It also includes details on different ways to finish the ornaments, such as stitching on plastic canvas and trimming to size, using regular cross-stitch fabric backed with felt or adding batting and backing to make a more three-dimensional shape, among other options.

This book is a lot of fun to look at and to stitch from and should give you a lot of ideas for your own holiday decor as well as gifts.

About the book: 64 pages, paperback, 160 patterns. Published by Leisure Arts, retail price $9.99.

Looking for more Christmas Cross Stitch patterns? Check these out on Etsy.

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How and Why to Cross Stitch on Plastic Canvas

The designs from Bella Rose Craft look like they would be good for beginner cross stitchers and others who like relatively simple and small designs that are quick to finish for gifts or decor.

I’ll mention up front that this Etsy shop based in Indiana has no organization whatsoever. There are two categories: kits and patterns. So it’s a bit of a treasure hunt to find what you might be interested in.

As mentioned there are lots of minis and small looking projects with simple lines and minimal colors. There are holiday projects, animals, summer motifs like palm trees and beach umbrellas, a bathtub with a rubber duck, some text based designs (like hoppy spring and merry and bright), some biblical and religious designs, flowers, bunting and more.

On a site like this its difficult to pick something representative of the whole page, but I liked this bees and beehive design, so it’s the one I picked to share. This one illustrates a lot of my general points about the patterns from this shop. It’s small (2.79 by 2.57 inches, or about 7 by 6.5 cm on 14 count fabric), it looks like it’s all whole cross stitches and probably uses only six colors, and a couple of colors are only used for a handful of stitches.

Of the 300 plus cross stitch patterns available as of this writing, 140 are also available as cross stitch kits. These would be great to give as gifts if you’re trying to get someone interested in cross stitching. The kits include the pattern, fabric and floss, and you can choose to have it include a needle or not. The hoop is not included but the patterns explain what kind of hoop is shown if you want to get one to match.

So if you’re looking for cute, beginner friendly patterns for yourself or you’re trying to be a crafty enabler for someone else, check out Bella Rose Craft on Etsy.

[Photo: Bella Rose Craft]

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