Is it just my imagination or is counted cross stich making a big revival lately?
Over 40 years ago I did a LOT of counted cross stitch. It all started when I was the project "engineer" on a job site in Iowa and we got rained out one day. I wandered around the Main Street area of the small town we were working in, and ended up walking into a yarn shop. They also had lots of kits for small counted cross stitch and I bought one to take back to my motel room for something to do. The next week I went back and bought more. It was such fun, and it gave me something to do in the evenings in my motel rooms because I traveled a lot for work at the time. That first project was this farm scene plus the 4 seasons pieces that went with it. I had them framed.
For years this was one of my favorite stitching hobbies. I even did counted cross stitch on the front of a cute little outfit I made for my first baby. But then in my 30s I discovered quilting. And my eye sight required bifocals. So you can imagine that counted cross stitch mostly fell by the wayside. I did a few Christmas ornaments and small things, but that was pretty much all. But now I'm really wanting to do a couple of projects. I'm not giving up quilting however!!
While in the little stitchery shop on Monday afternoon I purchased 1 chart, ordered another, and bought a few supplies for the chart I ordered. This Christmas tree made of thread spools may be the project I work on first. I think I have just the right piece of Aida cloth waiting, and most of the floss colors.
Note to self - don't forget about the half-done cross stitch project aging on top of the dresser in the guest bedroom. This was a travel project for a few years, but I haven't been traveling since Covid, so there hasn’t been much progress lately. That is my story and I'm sticking to it.
I did a lot of counted cross-stitch in the 80s and 90s. Then my eyes made it difficult to stitch on the 22count that I loved, so I packed everything away. I still have floss and Aida cloth and a few patterns, but no motivation to stitch.
ReplyDeletei've done some recently as well to use up some aida scraps but...put more aida on my christmas list and downloaded a few patterns...LOL...only have one cross stitch UFO left!
ReplyDeleteOh gosh I am so laughing right now...you could have been writing about me! Yep I did gobs of stitching years and years ago and then quilting hit hard and the stitching got put in a tub in the basement. Last year I noticed a resurgent of it and I got the buy again too! But I can only do little bits at a time because of tennis elbow. But it is fun again!! Glad you jumped onboard the wagon:)
ReplyDeleteI love that you're picking up cross-stitching too. I've been working on 4 projects right now. I'm SLOW, but I do enjoy it, so I'll keep plugging along. I started the Beginners X-Stitch University through FQS, but I haven't been able to keep up.
ReplyDeleteI loved to cross stitch, my daughters did too...we did lots of sweatshirt designs back in the 80's and early 90's. I have lots of floss in boxes just like yours...maybe someday I will pick it back up again. My sister in law is doing bibs with a cross stitch banner for a childs name:)
ReplyDeleteI have started cross stitching also in the last couple of months. The difference is that I got rid of all of my supplies back in the 90's when it was too hard to see the grids. I think that my cataract surgery helped with that problem in the last couple of years.
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