The Five-Minute Stitch! Mini Kit Rotation – EP02
Welcome to Episode Two of our Mini Kit Rotation!
The Current Project: Let’s Set Sail By Bucilla
Today’s video has me finishing the bottom middle portion of the right hand sail.
Tag: little thread crafts
The Five-Minute Stitch! Mini Kit Rotation – EP01
Welcome to Episode One of our Mini Kit Rotation!
The Current Project: Let’s Set Sail By Bucilla
Today’s video launches straight into stitching on the sail portion to the right of the mast.
The Five-Minute Stitch! Mini Kit Rotation – INTRODUCTION
Hey guys! So today I am starting on a new Five-Minute Stitch project… the Mini Kit Rotation! This video introduces the concept and explains what I’m going to be doing. For the next several months there will be a video uploaded to this YouTube Channel every other day as I work through three different mini kit projects and complete them. This video is only the introduction, so keep an eye out throughout the week to see our Mini Kit Rotation started!
We Are Back! :D
Well, after many more months than I anticipated, Little Thread Crafts is back up on its feet! All 170 of our articles have been copied over, re-formatted, re-pictured, and re-posted for your viewing pleasure.
We’ve undergone a complete and total overhaul both on the front end and the back end… we are now self-hosted by Blue Host, and I’ve got control of so much more than I had before. All to make the content better for myself and readers to come together and chat about our crafts and our community!
Now that we are finally caught up on two years’ worth of posts, new content will start up on the site. New Term of the Week, new videos, more tutorials… lots of good stuff coming! It took three months to deal with all the technical issues of the move, but rest assured they are now settled, and content will start up again! Woo! I’m so excited. 🙂
I will see you all next week when the new content starts!
The Rules of Cross-Stitch
Everyone has their own ‘rules’ when it comes to cross-stitch. It stems from the fact that more often than not, the community is almost wholly self-taught. When you first start out, the guides and the instructions only tell you the technique you need to learn: come up, come down, make an ‘x’. They don’t tell you how to do it, just that however you make an ‘x’ with needle and thread, that’s considered a cross-stitch.
For a beginner entering the cross-stitch community, the sudden amount of ‘rules’ can overwhelm. Backs must be neat, no carrying your thread, no waste knots, stitches must be consistent, work from the center, work from the corner, backstitch last, borders first, etc. etc.. The thing is, everyone will tell you a different set of rules based on what works for them.
The truth of the matter: cross-stitch HAS no rules. None. Despite what others may say about the craft, the ONLY rule of cross-stitch is that your threads must come together to make an ‘x’, because otherwise it’s not cross-stitch. That’s it. If you can make an ‘x’ on fabric, you can cross-stitch, and the personal method you use to create that ‘x’ can be whatever your heart desires.
I’m here to tell beginner stitchers that these so-called ‘rules’ are more like guidelines, created from thousands of years of stitchers figuring out what works best for them. (Yes, thousands of years – cross-stitch is considered one of the oldest forms of embroidery on the planet.) The personal guidelines for one stitcher may not work for another, who has developed their own methods and preferences when it comes to stitching.
As for me, my only ‘rule’ is this: all stitches must go in the same direction. If I start my piece with the bottom stitch / and the top stitch \, then all my stitches must go /\. To me, the finished piece looks cleaner and more uniform that way. This is an extremely common ‘rule’ that stitchers will tell others because it works and looks the best for the majority of the stitching community. Still, if you don’t like to have your stitches going the same way, you don’t have to do it.
I also railroad every cross-stitch, and I can tell you for a fact that that’s not a rule many others follow. Does it work for me? Yes. Does it work for others? Not always. (Don’t know what railroading is? See HERE.)
So don’t be overwhelmed when it comes to the ‘rules’ of the craft. There are no rules. You can pick and choose between thousands of years of work and pick whatever techniques and methods work best for you. Each finished piece is wholly unique to the individual who stitched it, and even if two stitchers followed the exact same guidelines their finished products wouldn’t look exactly the same. That is the beauty of the craft.
photo credit: Jamie Dobson Photography via photopin cc
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“Random Corner” is a place for all articles related to all manners of cross-stitchery and the cross-stitch community that don’t fall into the topics covered in the regular segments. There is no set schedule for Random Corner articles, they’re just random!
By the way – to keep up on Little Thread Crafts stitching news and get pictures, updates, and more that don’t appear on the blog until much later, follow me on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram! I would greatly appreciate it!
Progress Report: Families Photo Album, Part 3
Read The Previous Articles:
Families Photo Album: Part 1, Part 2
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As we rapidly approach the end of November and NaBloPoMo, I decided we might as well finish off with the Families photo album project!
Progress Report: Families Photo Album, Part 2
Read The Previous Articles:
Families Photo Album: Part 1
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I took a break from the Little Princess to stitch on the Families Are Forever chart for the photo album.
So here is where we left off last time:
Ooh, look how little space there is.
It’s time to start moving left to right, now that I’ve gone as far up and down as I can. I know the piece won’t fit completely but it’s good to have the border at least set so I can make sure. However, I’m trying to be really careful about carrying the black thread too far, so I ended up moving down instead of keeping right.
So here’s where I ended off:
The letters are slowly coming together.
Currently I’ve got a fully finished “i” and “r”. The “e”s are both only half finished because I don’t want to carry the black thread through the back and I haven’t stopped the thread to do those parts. Soon they will be all filled out! I’m making decent progress, plenty of time to finish by Christmas.
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Progress Report is an update on all my stitching habits, from the kits to the stitching to the finishing process and more! Right now I am featuring one of my cat-themed projects and several of the mini kits I’m currently working on, along with other pieces I like to pull out and work on at random.
By the way – to keep up on Little Thread Crafts stitching news and get pictures, updates, and more that don’t appear on the blog until much later, follow me on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram! I would greatly appreciate it!
Progress Report: Families Photo Album, Part 1
Today’s article is late because I spent today stitching and wanted that to be today’s upload!
This is the project I talked about in yesterday’s article, How Many Days Until Christmas?!
I bought this photo album several months ago with the intent to give it to my grandfather for Christmas. My grandmother, who passed away two years ago from cancer, used to be an avid photographer. She always loved photos. I worked with him over the summer to catalog some of her older photos, as their photo albums were falling apart. So I decided to buy him a new album as a Christmas present.
How Many Days Until Christmas?!
Oh my gosh, it’s the middle of November already. Where in the world did all the time go? Can I have have time back, please? I’m not ready for Christmas!
I mean, I am ready for Christmas. I’m from a family where we start decorating as soon as Halloween’s over. I’ve already got Christmas music on the radio. I’ve done a lot of my shopping already. (A lot – but not all. I’ve still got a lot of gifts left.) The boyfriend and I are getting our first tree for the apartment. It’s the kitten’s first Christmas. I’m excited!
What I’m less excited about is that I wanted to do stitched gifts again for Christmas this year, and yet again I haven’t started on any of them. We all know how well last year’s Christmas gifts turned out. It seems like I’m always too busy to start on projects for Christmas this time of year… I’ve moved three times in the last three years and each time it’s been towards the end of the year. But I don’t want to start working on projects in January or February!
I think part of the reason why I’m so behind on gifts this year, more so than even last year, is because I’m not sure how much of my family actually appreciates the stitching, and I’m nervous to give them anything. Stitching something takes a LONG time, especially if you’re slow like me. I’ve been seeing more and more stitching horror stories lately about people making pieces for their friends or family and having the gift go totally unappreciated, and in some cases, thrown away or given away in donations. With the amount of time I spend rescuing pieces from being thrown away and from thrift stores and the like, I’m terrified my stitching will end up in the same place.
It’s like… I see projects all the time and I think, “that will be wonderful for so-and-so!” But do I really want to put in hours and days and weeks of work into something if the other person is going to think it’s cheap or not valuable? Look, So-And-So, I spent a MONTH working on this, for YOU, when I could’ve been doing a hundred other things!, is what I would like to say to this imaginary person.
I guess the easiest solution would be to ask the intended receivers of the stitched gifts if they would like to actually receive them. My mind rebels against that. I don’t want to ask. Don’t ask me why. Maybe I’m afraid that I ask and it turns out no one wants my stitching that I put so much time and effort into. Thousands of stitches a month, hundreds of words on the blog, devoted to this one subject, and yet no one in my family will take a stitched gift.
I know that isn’t true, though. I know several relatives who would love a stitched gift, and I don’t have to worry about them ending up in the trash or some thrift store donation box. So I suppose I should stop worrying about imaginary people and focus on the people I know WILL want the gifts. Make things for them. And if there’s someone I’m on the fence about, I can either ask or let them approach me about stitching something for them. I’m not so poor I can’t buy those people regular gifts, and take the time to make things for people who will appreciate them!
… Of course I have this epiphany now and once again I’m reminded there’s a month and a half until Christmas. And I’m a slow stitcher now on crunch time who does not do well under high pressure, as we learned last year. So… I should probably put my grand plans to bed until next year.
My Sweet Baby finish is definitely being given away for the baby’s first Christmas, and I have another project I’ve yet to start but is a very fast stitch as an insert for a photo album. There’s two. Same number as last year. I can reach this one manageable goal, right?
Right. I can do this. Christmas 2014, here I come!
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“Random Corner” is a place for all articles related to all manners of cross-stitchery and the cross-stitch community that don’t fall into the topics covered in the regular segments. There is no set schedule for Random Corner articles, they’re just random!
By the way – to keep up on Little Thread Crafts stitching news and get pictures, updates, and more that don’t appear on the blog until much later, follow me on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram! I would greatly appreciate it!
The Five-Minute Stitch! EP30 – Video Challenge Day 5
Welcome to Episode 30 of the Five-Minute Stitch!
Oh man, what a day I’ve had! Sorry for the video coming a little later than usual today. I talk about not wanting to stitch the gold for fear I’ve separated my colors wrong.