Should You Use Special Needles for Cross Stitch?

I’m going to confess something, which you can probably guess what it is by the headline of this post, but I have never spent much time thinking about the kind of needle I use when I do cross stitch.

Does it fit in the holes of the cross stitch fabric? Sold.

I may just be lucky that I happen to have a good supply of needles of all sorts of thicknesses, sharpness levels and lengths in my house from years of craft hoarding and inheriting other people’s crafty things. But that can cause its own problems because old needles can get dull (maybe even rusty?) or snag your work, and of course it’s always the best idea to have the best tools you can afford that are available to you.

So having said all that, I needed to read this post from Catkin and Lillie all about different needles for use in cross stitch. Just like other kinds of needles we come across in our crafting life, sewing needles come in different sizes that are appropriate for different kinds of stitching.

The key is the finer the fabric you’re using (that is, the higher count) the smaller needle you need so it will go through the holes easily. And bigger numbers mean smaller needles.

The post over there of course goes into a lot more detail about what size needle is appropriate for different kinds of fabric and other considerations when it comes to choosing what needle you should be stitching with. There’s even a video that will show you what happens if you use a needle of an inappropriate size for your fabric.

It also covers different types of needles beyond size, such as petite needles, gold-plated needles, sharps and ball-point tips and more. Some of these are options I didn’t even know existed!

It’s definitely worth a read if you want to make your stitching life a little easier by using the right tools. And who wouldn’t want that?

[Photo: Catkin and Lillie]

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40+ Christian Cross Stitch Patterns

The other day I shared some cross stitch patterns with ornaments on them, so this time around I wanted to share cross stitch patterns that you can use as ornaments. It would be fun to do a whole tree in your craft room with cross stitch ornaments, or just add a few to your tree or give them as gifts.

These little quilt inspired cross stitch patterns from Flamingo Toes look like ornaments and fit in 3-inch hoops, which are perfect for hanging on the tree or using to decorate a gift. I love the pastel colors on these but you can use more traditional Christmas colors if you like.

This cute Christmas tree from Lagodargetoshop uses a single color and fits in a 4-inch hoop, but you could make it smaller if you wanted by trimming the last ornaments and gifts from the sides, or just stitch the tree without any other embellishments. Either way it’s a cute addition to your holiday tree.

Stitched Modern has a super cute collection of retro Christmas ornament cross stitch patterns from designer Gera. This is a printed pattern that will be shipped to you. Each pattern is about 40 by 56 stitches, or 2.9 by 4 inches/7.4 by 10 cm on 14 count fabric. To work the whole set you’ll need 20 colors of floss.

These snowflake ornaments from Our Little Handmade Home are each about 2.5 inches/6.4 cm when stitched on 14 count fabric, and they use a single color of floss. They are pretty in red but you could also do white on a blue or black background, or whatever suits your other Christmas tree decorations!

From the description it sounds like this set of vintage style cross stitch characters is presented as one large chart, but the photo from Sampler Antique Stitch shows each of them stitched up as their own little ornament, so it gets included here. You’ll find Santa and snowmen in different poses in this cute collection.

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