Designer Spotlight: Sam X Stitch

I usually pick my designer spotlights because something will catch my eye while I’m looking for cross stitch patterns to share with you, and I don’t always remember what when I get back to them.

In the case of Sam X Stitch I did helpfully leave myself the note “modern samplers love the mushrooms.” This turned out to be essential because that pattern wasn’t on the front page of the shop so I couldn’t remember what had caught my attention.

It was these mushrooms, since we’re already talking about them. My teen is very into cottagecore and fairy/with vibes with a side of grunge, so mushrooms are very much her thing. This mushroom sampler features a bunch of different species of mushrooms, which is fun because so often you just see the red and white ones in cross stitch patterns.

This design is 153 by 153 stitches, or 10.93 inches or 27.75 cm square and uses 16 colors. If I didn’t already have a cross stitch on the go for my daughter I would definitely grab this one.

But there’s a lot more to this shop than ‘shrooms. They have more than 200 patterns including flowers, birds, insects, ocean themed projects, animals, botanicals and more. There are landscapes, patterns for Christmas and other holidays (Halloween, St. Patrick’s Day, Mardi Gras and Easter), tiles and animal prints and cute projects for the kitchen.

There are even a few in a category called “masterpieces,” which translate famous artworks into cross stitch designs.

I love how these patterns feel modern, even the ones that are vintage/Art Deco in style. There’s lots of color here, too, with floral folk art designs and Art Nouveau style flowers.

If you like animals, classic designs, folk art, flowers, bugs or birds, you’re sure to find something you want to stitch here.

You can check it all out at Sam X Stitch’s Etsy shop.

[Photo: Sam X Stitch]

Mushroom Cross Stitch Patterns

Designer Spotlight: Happy Little Mouse

Cross Stitch Mushroom Sampler

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Mushroom Cross Stitch Patterns

I have never stitched a greeting card, but I kind of like the idea of it. It’s a card and a gift all in one, and hopefully one the recipient will hang onto for years to come.

This collection of easy and colorful greeting card cross stitch patterns from Susan Bates (via Gathered) are a great place to start if you want to stitch your own greeting cards.

These text-based designs cover a lot of card-sending events, such as:

get well soon
happy birthday
thank you
thinking of you
congratulations
anniversary
new home
good luck

The lettering is done in gradients and there are other details like hearts and stars, a house key and a gift, depending on the text. There are full cross stitches and back stitch on all of the cards, and they use 15 colors for the cross stitching and six for the back stitching (and just two colors are used for both, so it’s 19 colors total).

The designs vary a bit in size but the biggest one is 52 by 67 stitches, which comes out to 3.75 by 4.75 inches or 9.5 by 12 cm when worked on 14 count fabric or 28 count evenweave. The text suggests beads are also used in the patterns but there’s no note of them in the key, so go wild and add some beads if you like.

Designs are worked on a price of 6 by 8 inch/15 by 20 cm fabric and then mounted to a card with a colorful baking piece of card stock behind it. This is easy to assemble with whatever cardstock greeting cards you have on hand.

You can get the free charts as a PDF from Gathered.

Have you ever stitched your own greeting cards? I’d love to hear about it, or let me know if these inspire you to try.

[Photo: Susan Bates via Gathered]

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