I may not be 21 yet, but I’m pretty sure I’m already a grandma at heart. I was further assured of this when my roommate suggested that we learn how to cross stitch and I agreed. We were off to JoAnn’s and wandering aimlessly until we finally found everything we thought we needed. After making my first one, I was hooked. We ended up going to JoAnn’s three days in a row and spent hours and hours cross stitching while watching TV.
Lately, I’ve been getting a lot of questions about how to make them as well as a bunch of requests for me to make one for them, so I thought I’d post a little something on how to make them. Try not to give them away to any mutual friends though, because that’s my thing…my only thing. I wish I was kidding, but do you know how hard original gifts are these days?!
Here is an easy YouTube video on how to do it, and that’s really all you need to know:
As the lady in the video stated, you really only need these materials to begin:
– A wooden hoop (there are different sizes)
– Aida (the fabric with holes in it)
– Needle
– Thread (standard embroidery thread aka friendship bracelet string)
Besides that here are 10 tips from my own experience:
1. Divide up the friendship bracelet string, so that you’re only using two strands of it.
2. Go slowly when pulling apart the string or it becomes a huge mess.
3. I disagree with the lady in the video: I know my string in the beginning. It looks bad on the back, but since you display the front, it doesn’t matter to me. Plus, it makes it a lot easier.
4. Go on Google or Pinterest to find patterns. Search anything you’d like to make or the alphabet if that’s what you prefer.
5. The less colors in the pattern, the less complicated it will be.
6. If you are using a pattern that has numbers by the colors that means that you can find that exact color at fabric stores, so write it down before you go shopping.
7. Something that requires a large picture, even if it’s one color, will take a very long time.
8. That being said, I prefer sayings, because they take significantly less time and are less discouraging. If it takes you days to do one part of the pattern, you can get bored with it. Here’s a good alphabet pattern.
9. Make sure you measure out where the middle of the aida is when you put it in the hoop. From there you should also measure out where you should start, so the whole thing is centered.
10. Make sure you do the same number of spaces between each letter in a word and the same number between each word (make sure that number is bigger that the other).
Honestly, it looks and sounds a lot more complicated than it is! If you’re interested, just give it a shot. The materials are inexpensive, so the worst that can happen is you hate it and never do it again.
Here are some great (and easy) patterns that I think may help persuade you, including a couple photos of one’s I have done: