Ways to Make Your Cross Stitches Neater

When we start cross stitching, most of the time we are just focused on getting the needle into the correct hole in the fabric and keeping our tension even so that our stitching looks good. But over time you might want to refine your technique to make your stitches even neater.

One of the problems with cross stitching is that the thread tends to twist as we stitch, making stitches that don’t lie totally flat. The good news is lots of smart stitchers have figured out ways to counteract that twist and help make stitches that look better across a project.

You can read about three of these methods in depth over at HubPages, but I’ll cover them really quickly here.

The first I have talked about before and that’s railroading, which is where you split the two threads you are stitching with and take your stitch between them to keep them separate and therefore untwisted. (Read more about that here.) This is pretty easy to do and once you start doing it, will become a habit pretty quickly.

The post linked above also suggests that you can counter the twist in your thread by taking the needle through the fabric eye first instead of needle tip first when coming up from the back of the work. I’ve never tried this but it sounds like it would be pretty awkward.

Another thing that can help is just making sure that when you are stitching, the working thread is positioned above the area where you are making stitches. This doesn’t really help with the twisting, but it can help the stitches look more even and lie flatter on the fabric.

Have you tried any of these techniques? Do you have other tips for making your cross stitches neater? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

[Photo via HubPages]

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How to Railroad Your Cross Stitch

If you like repeating cross stitch designs, borders you can use on other projects or as bookmarks, florals and Japanese-inspired designs, you’ll want to check out 200 Japanese Cross Stitch Designs by Saeko Endo. This collection of 200 cross stitch charts is low on instruction but big on inspiration for those who are comfortable taking a chart and running with it.

The book includes a brief introduction to the needed supplies and basics of stitching, but mostly is just photographs of finished designs and the charts that go with them. The charts vary widely in size and there can be anywhere from one to six charts printed on a single page.

Many of the designs are repeating patterns, but the chart shows a larger version so you can see how the repeats go together. Each chart has marked what portion is repeating and how many stitches and rows it includes. Other than that the charts are not numbered, but there are darker lines every five rows to help you count.

The patterns all range from one to three colors, and some include half cross stitches or back stitching, but most are full stitches.

The book is arranged into categories of motifs: geometric patterns, retro patterns, traditional Japanese patterns, floral and fauna and borders and pictorial motifs.

My favorites are the Japanese designs, many of which are recognizable from woodcuts, kimono designs and traditional shashiko embroidery. You’ll find cherry blossoms, suns, knots, and simple line designs that would be lots of fun to stitch.

There are a few pages devoted to different ways to modify charts such as changing colors, changing the way to design is repeated, flipping and rotating designs.

Other than that you’re on your own for how you actually want to use these designs. Of course they can just be stitched and framed but it might have been nice to see some of the projects stitched and staged in a way you might use them in everyday life (repeating motifs as coasters, or a bigger design turned into a pillow, for example).

Sometimes it helps to see designs used in different ways to get you thinking about how you might use them yourself. If you don’t need that creative push, this is a fine book full of patterns you’ll have fun playing with in different ways.

About the book: 112 pages, paperback, 200 patterns. Published 2025 by David & Charles. Suggested retail price $24.99.

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