Cross Stitch Tips

Counted cross stitch is extremely easy to learn and do. It’s very flexible too -- you can sit and stitch for hours, or carry it with you and do a few stitches while waiting for someone. It’s also about the least expensive pastime (per hour) that there is. Sitting in the dark might cost a little less but it’s not as much fun!

If you are new to cross stitch, these tips will help you get started, and see also our illustrated tutorials. If you are an experienced stitcher, you may still find some new ideas here -- and if you have tips of your own to share, please let us know and we’ll add them!

If you'd like to print the tips to have handy while stitching, we have printer-friendly cross-stitch tips.

We recommend size 24 or 26 tapestry

needles. It’s useful to have several. See the stitching section for tips on saving time by using multiple needles. In addition, needles wear out. They get lost. They rust. If your needle seems to be shredding the floss unduly, the eye may have gotten rough (we don’t know how this happens but it does). They bend. So have some spares around.

For stitching with one strand over one, you may like to try a size 10 beading needle. Beading needles are very slender needles with an eye the same thickness as the body of the needle, so they fit more easily under tiny stitches for anchoring your floss at the end.

There are also Spiral Eye side-threading needles, available from spiraleyeneedles.com They are easy to thread because the eye is open on the side. You just wrap the floss around the needle, slide it up, and it locks into the eye. You don’t have to be able to see the eye to thread the needle. They come in two sizes. The SE-1, equivalent to a size 22 tapestry needle, is a bit large for some fabrics but is easier to thread. The SE-2, equivalent to a size 24 tapestry needle is a better size for cross stitch, but has a smaller eye opening. They cost more than ordinary needles but if you have trouble threading your needle, they’re worth a look.

An interesting option is a double-pointed needle. These needles are about twice the length of an ordinary needle and have an eye in the middle. They are supposed to make stitching faster because you never turn the needle around. You come up through the fabric with the upper point first, then go back through the fabric with the lower point first. It takes some practice to get used to them but because of not turning the needle around the floss doesn’t become twisted as readily. A disadvantage is that since the center is not thicker, the eye walls are thin and the needles break easily.

If you notice that a needle has become rough, it may have some tiny rust spots. A nail buffer works well to remove them. Crocus cloth, if you have a hunk in the garage, would probably be about the right grit also. Or if you have one of those tomato pincushions with a strawberry attached, the strawberry contains emery powder for this purpose.

If you have dropped a needle, use a flashlight to search for it -- the shine will give it away.

There are a number of considerations in choosing your fabric, and they are somewhat interrelated, but we will try to address them one at a time.

There are all kinds of fabric suitable for counted cross stitch. They are usually woven in 60-inch widths. Probably the most common and familiar are aida cloth and linen.

Aida is a stiff cotton fabric which has dense, evenly-woven threads with small holes between them. It’s inexpensive, easy to stitch on (but only suitable for whole cross stitch), and because of its stiffness, for small pieces you may not need a stretcher. It comes in many different colors, which aside from basic colors like white and ecru, tend to be bold, like kelly green. It is a less aesthetically pleasing fabric than most other types, but fine for situations where the fabric will not show (covered by stitching and matting).

Linen is more finely and loosely woven. Because of this it is normally stitched “over two’ -- each stitch covers two threads instead of one. Therefore, to get 16 stitches per inch with linen you need 32-count linen. It comes in many beautiful and subtle shades. It’s expensive and worth it. The threads vary slightly in widths and sometimes there will be slubs where the spinning process went awry. These irregularities normally don’t hurt anything.

There are many other even-weave fabrics, some soft, some crisp, in a variety of fibers, colors, and prices. Feel free to be creative.

Cross stitch fabric comes in different thread counts. This is simply the number of threads per inch. Stitch count is the number of stitches per inch, which is the same as the thread count if you stitch “over one”, and half of the thread count if you stitch “over two”. Low stitch counts (10, 12, 14) mean large stitches; higher stitch counts (16, 18, and above) mean smaller stitches. Usually, if the thread count is above 25, you will need to make your stitches over two threads instead of one. 32-count linen, stitched over two, results in 16 stitches per inch. 22-count fabric can be stitched either over one for a stitch count of 22, or over two for a stitch count of 11.

We recommend stitching with at least 16 or 18 stitches per inch, because the smaller the stitch, the less the fabric will show through, and the more your work will look like a painting. We have stitched floss coverage examples on fabrics of several different thread counts, using various numbers of strands. Follow the link to see pictures.

You are welcome to use a lower stitch count if you wish. But keep in mind that larger cross stitch patterns will require very large pieces of fabric at low stitch counts and you may have trouble finding a big enough piece of fabric. The pre-cut, pre-packaged fabric that you find at chain craft stores are generally not large enough for our patterns. You will need to find a shop where they sell fabric by the yard. If you don’t have such a shop locally, try our list of retailers.

Some of our patterns do not have a stitched background, and are designed to be stitched on a particular color fabric. The reason we specify color is not really so that you can reproduce the appearance of the example, but because the edge stitches are designed to blend into the background. If you don’t use the color fabric we recommend, you will have some edge stitches that stick out visually.

Stitching on black fabric is more difficult than stitching on lighter colors. On light colors, the spaces between the threads show up dark and are easy to see. On dark fabric they don’t show up at all. You can make life easier by putting a light under the fabric -- even a flashlight will do, but there are special lights for this purpose designed to sit nicely on your lap. One such is the Needlework Up-Light, made by The Daylight Company. Check with a cross stitch shop. (added 2/15/06)

For our pieces which are a solidly stitched rectangle, you can use any color you like! You may want to select a color which accents the picture nicely. Or use a light color if the picture is mostly light, or a darker color if much of the picture is dark. If you are stitching at 16-count or higher, and stitch carefully, the fabric should not show, so you can always use white, though if you have a choice of colors, an ecru or oatmeal or other neutral midtone color is a good choice for most patterns which have a range of both light and dark colors.

To determine the amount of fabric you need to buy, use our fabric calculator The size of the stitched area will depend on the stitch count you choose and the number of stitches. You need to add a few inches to allow for framing. If you don’t want the frame to be at the edge of your stitching, you’ll need to add some more for a visible border around your work, or to make room for a mat. The fabric calculator will calculate the total for you and show you how it will look. You can play with different stitch counts and experiment with proportions for the border.

You should decide how you want to frame your piece before you buy fabric. Many cross stitch shops also do framing so ask to look at their frames before you look at fabric. What kind of frame will look best? A narrow metal frame for a modern picture, or a wide gilded frame for a classic still life? Will there be a mat or a fabric border, and if so, how wide? If you want a fabric border, this will affect your choice of fabric style and color. If the fabric is NOT going to show, you might as well use white or ecru aida and save some money. If the fabric IS going to show, use linen or another even-weave in a color that compliments the picture and the probable frame color. When you find some fabric you like, it will push you into a particular stitch count, and THEN you can calculate how much fabric you will need. Ask the shop to check your calculations if you have any doubt. It’s better to get too much fabric than not enough.

If you are going to stitch using a scroll frame, you should straighten the edges of the fabric so that the sides you attach to the scroll bars parallel the grain of the fabric. This will allow you to keep an even tension on the fabric as you stitch. (You don’t need to straighten the edges if you are using a hoop, Q-Snaps, etc.) The goal is to have the edge of the fabric be a single thread that runs the entire length (or width). If your fabric was cut unevenly, and you can see that one side is longer than the other, start at the end of the shorter side. To straighten the edge of aida cloth, you can just cut carefully between two threads. For linen or fine weaves, pull a thread. Make a short snip into the fabric so you can separate one thread. Gently pull the thread. The fabric will gather up around it. Keep smoothing the puckered fabric away from you as you pull. This creates a line you can see to cut along. If the thread breaks before you are finished, cut to the break point, then start again from there.

Binding the edges of the fabric before you begin work is a good idea. Almost any kind of cross stitch fabric will gradually fray (more rapidly if you are using a hoop). There are several ways to do this: you can hand-whip the edges, run a machine zig-zag stitch along the edges (we aren’t good at this and it always seems to pre-fray the fabric), use Dritz Fray-Check or a similar product, or even fold a piece of masking tape over the edges! Another idea is to put a folded piece of bias tape along the edges and use a zig-zag stitch to attach it. This creates a smooth edge that doesn’t catch the floss, but it does add some thickness so it would not be ideal if you’re using a scroll frame. Our favorite is Fray-Check. This is a thin glue that comes in a tube. You just run a narrow line along the edges of your fabric and let it dry (about half an hour). Be sure to protect your work surface as you apply the glue -- it will go right through the fabric and ruin your nice table.

Some people feel that Fray-Check (and definitely tape) are not “archival-quality” solutions and that the glue may deteriorate or do something strange to the fabric after many years. This might be -- but you can always cut the treated edges off when you’re finished stitching. (Just remember to allow a little extra fabric so you can.)

If you have managed to acquire fabric which is dirty or even has dirt spots, wash and iron it before beginning to stitch. Even if the dirt is in a place where it won’t show, dirt is bad for your work. And looking at dirty fabric is depressing!

Our patterns are charted for DMC cotton floss. We don’t have conversion tables for other brands. There are conversion tables on the internet, but if you possibly can, go to a shop that carries DMC and your preferred brand and find the matches that look best to YOU.

You should decide on the length to which you want to cut your floss in advance, and stick to that length (even across projects). It will probably be somewhere between 18 and 30 inches. The floss may tend to fray after a while (especially if you are stitching on aida) so you may prefer to stay near the shorter end of the spectrum. 24 inches is a comfortable length for us and only wastes a couple of inches at the end of the skein. The reason for a standard length is that a color may be used in a number of blends. If you always cut the 6-strand floss to the standard length, then the single strands you need to blend will always be the same length. It’s helpful to mark a gauge on your frame or a nearby piece of furniture so that you don’t have to pick up a ruler to measure the floss length.

Some people like to cut their floss to length at the beginning of a project. Others cut as they go.

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Stitching