New Year’s Resolutions for Cross Stitchers

As the year comes to a close, you might be thinking about things you want to do, or do differently, in your life in the next year, and your crafting life should definitely be part of whatever resolutions or goals you set.

I feel like one of the most common goals for crafters of all varieties, not just cross stitchers, is to be more organized. Earlier this year I shared a post about organizing cross stitch supplies, and in the vault you’ll find ideas for storing embroidery floss in particular, as well as this post about how one cross stitcher uses a Caboodles box to keep her projects contained.

You might also want to finish projects that you’ve started but abandoned in the past, or to let go of some things that you know you’ll never finish (if you need help decluttering your craft supplies, I’ve got an ebook to help!).

Making more time for your crafts is another good goal, and may be especially important if you’re trying to avoid the news or social media. Start small, with scheduling in an extra 10 or 15 minutes a day, or declare that after supper is craft time, or whatever you need to do to hold that time for yourself. Doing something like a 100 day project is an easy way to commit to working on a craft regularly.

Another resolution you might consider is learning new skills or trying more difficult projects. I’m guilty of staying in the beginner zone when it comes to cross stitch for a really long time, but writing about it here has inspired me to try bigger, more colorful and more difficult projects, which is the challenging kind of fun. If there’s a project you’ve always wanted to do but were afraid to try, make this coming year the time you do it.

And if you are still learning the basics of cross stitch, check out my learn to cross stitch guide over at Our Daily Craft.

Do you have a cross stitch related resolution or something you want to learn this year? I’d love to hear about it!

One of the easiest ways to make a cross stitch project more personal is to add text to it. Whether you’re adding the names of people getting married to a generic floral cross stitch design, birth information to a project on theme with the new baby’s room or just adding a word or phrase that’s meaningful to you, adding words to cross stitch projects make them that much more special.

But if you’re not working with a project that already has text built in, or you want to change the text that’s there, that can feel a little daunting.

Caterpillar Cross Stitch has a great guide to adding names and words (as well as numbers) to projects, which talks you through what to consider and how to actually go about adding text to a cross stitch project successfully.

You’ll need to think about what kind of font you want to use and if you’re using back stitched letters or larger filled letters, how much space you need and how the letters work together in the text you’re planning to make sure it’s readable.

Their post includes common pitfalls such as running out a space or ending up with text that’s off center and how to avoid them (spoiler: chart out your text before you stitch!).

The whole post is really helpful if you’ve never added lettering to a project before and don’t know where to start. I like to use block letters in back stitch when learning how to add text to cross stitch, but of course there are tons of lettering options. Check out this collection of cross stitch fonts if you want to see some different things you can try.

And head over to Caterpillar Cross Stitch to get more tips for how to successfully add lettering to your cross stitch projects. They also have their own alphabet and number charts you can buy to add text to your stitching.

Have you ever added text to a cross stitch project? I’d love to hear how it went!

[Photo: Caterpillar Cross Stitch]

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