How to Grid Cross Stitch Fabric

I’ve started (just barely, as you can see) a relatively big/complicated cross stitch project (the Baba Yaga house from Happy Little Mouse I told you about a while ago) and I knew that for this project I was going to need a little help keeping track of where I was and what I needed to do next.

Adding grids to your cross stitch fabric is a quick and easy way to help yourself when you’re working on a big project. Your chart will have grids marking off every 10 stitches and every 10 rows, so having those same markings on your fabric can only make it easier for you to follow along.

There are a few main ways to do this, which include marking the grid with thread (either embroidery floss, sewing thread, thread marketed for this purpose, or even fishing line!) or using fabric marking tools to draw the grid. Using a ruler when you do this helps a lot. Mine are still not that straight.

You can also buy cross stitch fabric that’s already marked, which of course makes it a lot easier, but it’s kind of expensive.

When marking your fabric it helps to know where the center of your fabric is, as well as where the center of the chart is relative to the grid marks so you can line them up.

This makes it a lot easier to orient yourself in the chart, and if you have a lot of one color all together it can make it easier to count stitches. Say you had 23 stitches in a row of the same color; stitching across two squares plus three stitches is a lot easier to keep track of than having to manually count them as you go.

Want to learn more about gridding cross stitch fabric and why you would want to? Check out my post all about ways to grid cross stitch fabric over at Our Daily Craft.

[Photo: Our Daily Craft]

Stitchissimo is an Etsy shop based in Bulgaria that has a heavy focus on bookmarks and cards, often with a religious spin, as well as adorable animal cross stitch patterns. Let’s take a closer look.

The biggest category in the shop (though not by much) is baby animals, and there are lots of cute options, from a horse to butterflies, a capybara to sea creatures, farm animals and more.

Since this is a year when ducks are really popular, here’s their duck cross stitch pattern, which is pretty representative of the style of these projects. This mini cross stitch design is just 27 by 33 stitches and it uses four colors, making it a great option for someone new to cross stitch (which all of the animals would be).

On 14 count fabric the design comes out to almost 2 by 2.4 inches, or 4.9 by 6 cm, so it would fit in a three or four inch hoop.

Coming in a close second is the bookmark section (there’s also a separate kids’ bible bookmark category), which includes a wide variety of projects often featuring flowers, fruit or some other image along with a quote from the bible. The kids’ section is the same, only with cute animals decorating them instead of flowers.

There’s also a large collection of Christmas and winter themed projects. Many have a religious bent such as nativity scenes and angels, but there are also snowmen, Christmas foods and winter scenes with cute animals.

Other categories include sentiments to stitch for greeting cards, spring and Easter themed projects and “boy decor” (mini cross stitch patterns of vehicles). Smaller categories include summer, autumn and the Fourth of July.

These projects are cute and colorful, and a lot of them are small, which makes them great for beginners. It’s an especially great place if you like religious themed projects and bookmarks.

Check out all the designs at Stitchissimo.

[Photo: Stitchissimo]

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