I’m usually not all that interested in making the back of my cross stitch projects very clean. I know it’s a nice thing to do, but I tie knots in my threads when I start stitching, and sometimes I’ll tie a knot at the end, too.
There are times when you might want to have a neater back to your work, or if you’re just the kind of person who likes to have a clean back even if it isn’t going to show, you might want a method other than tying knots to finish off your thread on a cross stitch project to make it nice and smooth.
Caterpillar Cross Stitch has a great video all about different ways to finish your cross stitch thread that will make your back clean and your stitches secure.
When I’m not tying knots I generally will weave in my ends on the back of the work, but did you know you can also weave in ends with the front of the work facing you? This is super helpful if you’re working on a big project in a frame or stand that can’t easily be flipped over to see the back of the work.
That’s one of the methods she talks about, but she also talks about parking thread so you can stitch over it later, the loop method and the pin stitch method (which is super clever and could be used at the beginning of a thread section as well as the end).
I don’t know that I’ll adopt any of these methods for my own projects since weaving works just fine for my purposes, but I’d love to know if you have used any of these methods and how they work for you. Are you team clean back or do you care as little as I do? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Check out the video from Caterpillar Cross Stitch on YouTube.
[Photo: Caterpillar Cross Stitch]
