Make Tiny Cross Stitch Magnets

I’ve been trying to come up with some different ways to use cross stitch this year, and one of the things I wanted to try was making cross stitch magnets.

I had the idea to use bottle caps as the base for the magnets because I’ve made a few magnets of that size before. Also we happen to have a lot of those little button magnets, which are the perfect size to go on the back of a bottle cap so you can’t see it on the other side.

I figure out that you get a space of about 10 by 10 stitches using 14 count fabric, which is plenty of space for a tiny bit of cross stitch. If you have any minis that little you can use whatever design you like, or grab some graph paper and design your own.

In the blog post linked below I also have a few simple designs I used on mine, including a heart, star, smiley face and square. You could stitch out an initial (or do the whole alphabet to make your own alphabet magnets amazingly adorable), make emojis, tiny flowers, whatever you like.

Check out this post on mini Christmas cross stitch patterns or this one on Easter minis for more ideas of things that might fit in a tiny space.

Each one of these takes just a few minutes to make and they’re a great handmade addition to your magnet board or fridge.

You can get the full photo tutorial over at Our Daily Craft. There’s also a video that walks you through the entire process if you need or want more details.

Would you make mini cross stitch magnets? What sort of tiny design would you like to stitch on one of these little projects? Or how else would you make a magnet that incorporates cross stitch? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

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How to Cross Stitch on a Chair

You know a little bit what you’re in for when you see the header for the Etsy shop Happy Sloth Patterns, whose tagline is “dumb patterns made by an idiot human.” Which at least implies there’s no AI to be found in the Australia-based shop, but also plenty of snark.

(That’s also clear from the images in the shop header, which include a bow-bedecked squirrel with the words “we’re all doomed but whatever.” You’ll find these in the category “unsupportive animals.”)

The biggest category is for animals and pets, and there’s plenty of sarcasm and silliness here. Since the people are all about geese this year (see also: goose cross stitch patterns) I couldn’t help share this silly goose who got a little too silly. This design is 87 by 69 stitches, which comes out to 6.2 by 4.9 inches, or 15.8 by 12.5 cm when stitched on 14 count fabric.

That would look great in an eight-inch hoop, though measurements are included for other counts in the pattern notes if you want to make it smaller. It uses eight colors.

Another big category is vintage style patterns, which include vintage looking often cartoony designs with more modern sayings. In a similar vein there is the quotes and text patterns section, which praises the virtues of prescription medications, offers plenty of puns and some throwbacks to the early days of personal computing.

There are also patterns that are specifically pop culture references such as a Pac Man game and designs inspired by Firefly, the Golden Girls and Dirty Dancing among many others.

And there’s a lot more to be found here, including patterns for Halloween, Christmas and Valentine’s Day, projects with wizards and mermaids, feminist and LGBT designs, some collections of mini patterns (including fairies, forest creatures, tiny rubber ducks and more) and a collection of emotional support animals that also don’t feel all that supportive.

There’s even a nice array of alphabets you can buy to use in your projects, everything from retro gaming fonts to one inspired by the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and one with flames inside the letters.

Check out all the goodies at Happy Sloth Patterns.

[Photo: Happy Sloth Patterns]

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