How to Cross Stitch on Clothing

Many, many years ago when I was in 4-H, I remember making a quilt for our leader who was having a baby that included different green and white fabric and we cross stitched the 4-H clover onto some of the squares.

That may have been the last time I used waste canvas to cross stitch onto regular fabric, but it’s such a fun and easy thing to do to add a bit of cross stitch to clothing or other fabric.

I have always loved the idea, for example, of stitching little motifs onto cloth napkins, which would be super easy to do with waste canvas. Maybe writing this post will inspire me to finally do it.

There is a little technique involved in using waste canvas to cross stitch on clothing (as well as removing any evidence of it once the stitching is done), but Thread Bare has a great tutorial with all the details you need to get started stitching on clothing.

Their tutorial shows adding a cross stitch design where you might have a pocket on a T-shirt, but there are lots of other options. I like the idea of using cross stitch as a way to cover a stain if it’s in a place where that would make sense. Or again just adding to fabric for cuteness. You can stitch a border along the edge of a skirt, put a design on an apron, or use it to personalize fabric for a quilt, pillow or other project.

This works on store-bought clothing or things you make yourself, thought it’s a little easier to stitch on lighter weight fabrics. If you’re working with something that stretches, like a T-shirt, you need to be careful you aren’t stretching or puckering the fabric as you go, but otherwise it’s a pretty simple project.

Check out all the details on how to use waste canvas to cross stitch onto fabric at Thread Bare.

[Photo: Thread Bare]

How to Cross Stitch on Linen

How to Cross Stitch on Paper

How to Cross Stitch on Crochet

To Ways to Back a Hoop to Frame Cross Stitch

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Cross Stitch Quilt Patterns

If you love patterns for frogs and sardines, animals, food, flowers and more, Happy Cross Stitchers has got you covered. With more than 1,600 patterns as of this writing, you’re almost guaranteed to find something you like.

I don’t know if I’ve missed something that cross stitch patterns featuring sardines are showing up everywhere (this is the second designer I’ve seen with them in the past month or so) but Happy Cross Stitchers has 60 sardine cross stitch patterns. They also have 200 patterns with flowers, and even more than that in their biggest category, which is animals.

Many of the animal cross stitch patterns have a modern nursery feel to them, like this set of four modern boho animal patterns featuring what I’m interpreting as owls, a moose (or it coulr be a deer), a donkey and a cow. Each individual pattern is 100 by 100 stitches and they use six or seven colors. The designs will come out to 7.1 inches or 18.14 cm when stitched on 14 count fabric.

There’s also a large number of Christmas cross stitch patterns, with lots of trees, little houses, Santas and word art. There are lots of bunnies, eggs and chicks in the Easter section.

The modern designs include lots of colorful, graphic florals. There are also well over 100 butterflies, many of which at least look like they could be inspired by real butterflies (though none of them are labeled as to what kind of butterfly they are).

You’ll also find plenty of cute and often funny cat and dog cross stitch patterns, though there are a lot more cats than dogs represented. And then there’s the food section, with patterns for fruits, different kinds of toast, a jar of pickles, doughnuts and more.

And that’s not even all there is in this store! I guess all this is a long way of saying there’s a lot of fun patterns at www.etsy.com/shop/HappyCrossStitchers on Etsy and you should go browse because you’ll probably find something you like. And if you do, I’d like to hear about it!

[Photo: Happy Cross Stitchers]

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