The Things You Do for Your Friends...

When I first started doing this stuff, I bought a book for a quarter called "1,001 Cross Stitch Motifs." It was published in England in the Seventies. I really like using it a lot because it is just small things that you can throw together and make your own bigger pattern. The first time I used it was that vacuum cleaner one I showed off earlier.

The only real problem is that it is old enough that some of the floss colors are out of date. There is nothing more frustrating (well, there are a few more frustrating things in the scope of things. War. Poverty. Whatever.) than making your little shopping list of floss numbers, getting to the store, and then finding out that the number you need is no longer made or has changed numbers. It's just irritating. Then you don't remember what the color was or anything, so you just have to guess or make due. That is what happened with the first one I made....


This was made for a friend of mine who is letting my family stay with her when the are here for graduation this weekend. That is a huge undertaking, trust me. And she refuses to be paid for it. So, I decided to make this. She plays the cello and is a music teacher. So, I picked up my handy dandy "1,001 Cross Stitch Motifs," looked in the index and BAM...there's a cello.

The actual body of the cello is the wrong color. The original one called for "Mahogany." It no longer exists. So now it is a golden cello. Magical. The "S" is her first initial. After I took the picture, I decided it was a little plain, so I added some musical notes in the right hand corner. It looks pretty good and she seemed happy with it.

I have found that Downy Wrinkle Releaser works pretty well to get rid of the hoop marks.



Then I needed to make something for another friend's birthday. I knew I wanted it to have a knitting theme. Luckily, "1,001" has a whole page of knitting and sewing things. There is also a page devoted to keys. And one for stamps. And one for muffins. It's that encyclopedic.

I needed to make it a little edgier, though. Well, as edgy as cross stitching something about knitting could possibly be. (which is a "3" edgy-wise) I found a phrase on Crafter.com or someplace that seemed to suit...



I had purchased the red material when Jo-Ann's was having a big sale on it. I had no idea what I would use it for, though. The letters are just the basic ones from "Subversive Cross Stitch."

This was a quick one to do once the idea came together and I plotted out the design. A little over and hour and a half stitching time. The only hard part was working with the metallic thread for the needles. I hate using it, but it always looks sort of cool. Like fake beading or something.

I only wish I would have spaced it out better.

It was also easy to get it to look nice because the red material was pretty heavy, so it wrinkled less.

Its funny. I like it.