Cross Stitch – Don’t Be Afraid to Change Colors

There’s a joke in the knitting world that designers will hear from people who love their patterns but have just one question: “Will it work if I knit it in blue instead of red?”

I don’t know if anyone has really asked that question, but I do know that the vast majority of people pick the exact same color yarn to work a project as is shown in the pattern.

Surely it’s the same for cross stitch.

And while it can be somewhat hard to visualize how a cross-stitch chart will look in, say, purple instead of yellow, it’s totally possible to alter the colors used in a project.

This could be as simple as using dark blue when the chart says light blue, or it could involve completely redrawing the pattern so that you can more easily see what changes you are making.

Red Tansy shows how to do this with a small chart, and its definitely easier if you’re going to have to redraw the chart to do it on a small pattern. But the same process works no matter the size, and can make a big difference in terms of the finished look of your project.

Have you ever swapped out colors on a cross-stitch design? I’d love to know how it went.

[Photo: Red Tansy.]

Looking for more Rose-themed cross stitch patterns or charts ? Check these out on Etsy and these on the DMC threads website.

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35+ Sunflower Cross Stitch Patterns

It’s back to school time where I live, which I always feel like is a great time to learn a new skill or take a deeper dive into something that you might not have learned a lot about before.

Usually when we are learning new hobbies we only know what we know. We learn the terms that we encounter, the skills that come up in the projects that we want to make. It’s not that we don’t care about other basics or different approaches, we just learn what we need to know to make what we want to make.

And that’s totally fine, but sometimes it’s a good idea to go back and review the basics or learn the things you might have missed the first time.

In that spirit I share this post from Caterpillar Cross Stitch all about basic cross stitch terms that every stitcher ought to know.

Did you know that the little bundle of thread you use for cross stitch is called a skein, for example? Or the difference between grid size and design area in a pattern? Or that working complete stitches one at a time is known as the English method? (I didn’t know that one! Apparently doing half of the stitch across the row and then coming back and finishing it is the Danish method. Who knew?)

There’s also a little bit about getting started with confidence that might be helpful at any skill level.

So what I’m saying is, even if you feel like you know a lot about cross stitch already, head over to Caterpillar Cross Stitch and check out their list of terms and make sure you know them all. If nothing else you’ll feel a little smarter, either because you already knew them all or you learned something new!

And if you do learn something new, I’d love to hear about it.

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