Stitch Up a World of Rainbows

This time of year rainbows are often associated with Pride, but they can have lots of different meanings or just be a color combination that you like.

In honor of loving rainbows all year long, check out this cute set of rainbow cross stitch patterns from Faby Reilly.

The Rainbow World patterns were originally made during covid as a fun way to spread love while staying at home, but of course we still need that community, connection and bright light even though the time for staying at home has long passed.

The set is a collection of hoops with a heart design that shows part of the globe in a darker color, surrounded by a heart of leaves and a border with more hearts and squares.

The idea was to work one in each color of the rainbow and display them together, but of course you can just stitch up one in your favorite color if you don’t want the whole set. I think these would be really cute stitched up on display in a baby’s room with other rainbow accessories, especially if the baby is a rainbow baby.

Each pattern is 40 by 40 stitches, which comes out to 3 inches or 7.5 cm when stitched on 14 count fabric. They’re shown in 3-inch hoops but you could also use 4-inch hoops and have a little white space around the edge or even add in some text if you want.

If you’re working all of the colors you’ll need 21 colors, but each chart uses three colors. In addition to regular cross stitches they use a lazy daisy stitch and a Rhodes heart (the pattern has a little photo tutorial for each). Each hoop also uses 4 seed beads, so you’ll need 28 total if you’re making all of them.

The pattern is available in English and French as a free download from Faby Reilly.

[Photo: Faby Reilly]

As a knitter, I love a good sheep motif, so let’s take a look at some cute sheep cross stitch patterns.

If you want to stitch a little sheep, this mini square from Good Dog Needleworks is a nice choice. It uses just three colors and measures 32 by 32 stitches. That’s 2.2 inches or about 5.5 cm square if you stitch it on 14 count fabric.

I also love these two little sheep, which you can stitch together or in individual hoops and shown. The designs are form Threadbound Art and use six colors. They are slightly different in size, with one being 21 by 17 stitches and the other 21 by 20. They fit in four inch frames if you work them on 14 count fabric.

You can stitch a sweet sheep bookmark with this design from Kits by SA Stitch. This is not for the person who doesn’t like back stitch, because there’s a lot of that here, but it is really cute. It measures 30 by 91 stitches and uses 10 colors. That will make your bookmark about 2.4 by 6.5 inches, or 6 by 16.5 cm on 14 count fabric.

Stitch a pretty scene of sheep in a meadow with this design from Motok Nytok. It uses 21 colors and the design is 99 by 73 stitches. On 14 count fabric that makes it about 7.07 by 5.21 inches, or 17.96 by 13.24 cm.

This yarn full of cross stitch sheep has a bit of a knitting twist because the sheep all look like they have sweaters on. The design is from Soda Stitch Design and it measures 179 by 216 stitches. The full design uses 27 colors. On 14 count fabric it will work out to 12.78 by 15.42 inches, or 32.48 by 39.19 cm.

Another great one with a knitting theme is this one where the wool is coming off the sheep and straight onto the needles. This one is from Happy Cross Stitchers and uses 12 colors. The pattern is 137 by 137 stitches, which comes out to 9.7 inches or 24.86 cm square on 14 count fabric. This would be a fun one to stitch for the knitter in your life (even if that is you).

Or you can stitch the field of sheep of a knitter’s dreams with the Happy Sheep chart from Charts and Stuff. These per-colored sheep can be stitched as shown or worked in any colors you like. The eyes are French knots but you can just stitch them in white if you’d rather.

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