Do you remember your first stitches? I remember my grandmother and great-grandmother teaching me to do embroidery somewhere around the age of 10-12. Back then you could by iron on patterns and I remember a denim shirt I stitched all over. I have a set of pillowcases I did for my grandparents around here somewhere - I think I have showed pictures of them before. (I had them on display in our last house but haven't put them out here - yet, I will eventually) I did quite a few pieces of stamped cross stitch and gave them as gifts. Then, sometime around 1980-81 I saw my first piece of counted cross stitch and fell in love with it! I bought a kit, it was a small Christmas piece. I just followed the directions - to me it didn't seem hard, it was similar enough to stamped cross stitch. Even with stamped cross stitch you have to follow a pattern for color placement. I was hooked from that first stitch. Anyway - then I found out you could buy patterns and fabric without having to buy a kit and this was the first book I bought.
I found it yesterday when going through some patterns. I don't know how many of those jar toppers I stitched. I'm pretty sure everyone I know got a mason jar with cross stitch on top for Christmas that year. I used that book so much it is falling apart but every time I purge, I always keep this book. There were other books with jar toppers, Christmas ornaments, fingertip towels, baby bibs and bookmarks (all stitched on aida) before I moved up to things large enough to actually frame. I have a few pieces and my mother still has some of my early pieces before I started stitching on linen. I remember my first piece I stitched on linen too. I had been stitching samples for a magazine (I stitched them and returned them to be finished and photographed - lots of fun) and they asked me if I had ever stitched on linen. I hadn't so she showed me a couple of stitches and sent me on my way. That piece went on a photo album. Remember those fabric covered photo albums that were so popular in the 80s and early 90s? I don't have the stitched piece but I have the magazine it was published in. I would show you a picture of that but it would mean digging deeper in the closet than I want to go right now. Someday.
That is how I got started and I still love it as much today as I did when I stitched that first little kit. Do you remember your first counted cross stitch project?
4 comments:
Hi Tina :)
I did maybe one cross stitch in my life lol Needlepoint is more my thing. I started when I was around twelve and have picked it up again, here and there. I have a new one waiting for me to start, in fact :)
Boy oh boy have you been busy since I visited last! Amazing what happens in a few months. Anyway, congratulations on the new house! It's beautiful. And thank you so much for the Christmas card :)
Hugs to you,
rue
I remember my first cross stitch well. It was a Christmas candle kit -- plastic canvas, yarn, and a large plastic needle. I was probably around 8 when I made it. Then I got creative and started stitching colored blocks on leftover pieces of aida with leftover thread from my mom's projects. (Where does that childish creativity go?) I stopped stitching for a couple years, until I went to college. I picked it back up then and haven't put it down since. That's over 20 years ago.
What a wonderful story of how it began for you! I do remember my first (own) counted cross stitch project; it was a bright piece by Leisure Arts on 14 count white aida. I have the leaflet around here somewhere, but the actual piece I gifted to my cousin for a Christmas gift. And I do remember those fabric covered photo albums; I made probably 50-75 of them and gave them as gifts plus sold a few.
My first was machine stitching Barbie clothes at age 5. My first embroidery was on a stamped baby bib around age 8. I still have it..unfinished. My first stamped cross stitch was around then too..helping my mom do a tablecloth and napkins. First crewel around age 10.
First counted cross stitch was a baby pic for my firstborn in 1981 on white Aida, using a chart. I love stitching.
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