Charts, patterns and everything needlepoint
The real Grumpy Cat is no longer with us, but we can remember that delightfully grouchy feline in stitching with this free cross stitch pattern from Brooke’s Books.
The design is 43 by 52 stitches and uses 13 colors. The ends of the snowflake are French knots but you could also use little beads if you wanted.
She has a whole freebie page but the direct link to the chart PDF is here.
[Photo: Brooke’s Books.]
The Dover Pocketbook Collection book Cross Stitch Flowers is a collection of floral designs by Gerda Bengtosson, reflecting the handworks of the Danish embroidery tradition. Haandarbejdets Fremme, known elsewhere as Danish Design, was a movement begun in 1928 to preserve and promote embroidery in the country.
The book includes 26 charts and a section on materials and basic instructions. The patterns are shown in a color chart on one page and include a thread palette and section for notes on the opposite page. The general descriptions of colors are used, such as dull blue green or earth color, rather than giving a DMC number or the code from a different thread company. This does allow you more wiggle room to use what you have but you may not necessarily end up with the same look the designer was going for.
That doesn’t really matter, though, and there are no photos of the finished stitched designs, just the charts, so it’s easy to go your own way and choose whatever colors you like. (There’s also space in the palette or in the notes section where you could write down the colors you use in case you want to duplicate the design in the future.)
The charts are large and have dark lines every 10 stitches or rows doe ease in reading. They look hand colored, and they only use full stitches so they should be relatively easy to stitch even though some of them are big. It would have been nice for the patterns to say approximately how big the finished design would be on different sizes of fabric so you know what you’re getting into without having to do the math yourself.
The patterns show a variety of flowers, from common plants like daisies and dandelions to snow gentian, plantain and Iceland poppy, to name a few. Most designs have around 8-10 different colors.
I feel like a lot of stitchers would want to see stitched versions of projects before they start stitching, but if you’re OK with just looking at the chart to decide what you want to stitch, this is a nice collection of floral patterns to stitch and a bare-bones book that allows you to focus on the charts without a lot of frills.
About the book: 64 pages, paperback, 26 patterns. Published 2025 by Dover Publications. Suggested retail price $9.99.
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