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Tears In A Vial
Jan 13, 2008

That drat Satyr posted:

Your first works are lovely! Please don't be discouraged because embroidery is "girly", because it sure as heck isn't. Some of the best needleworkers I know are dudes and they are fierce as hell with a needle.

Thread contribution:
I'm just home from a UK trip and I found an amazing little needlework shop in the town I was staying in, Hemel Hempstead. They carry something that I've never been able to find here in the states - DMC's full line of wool embroidery thread/yarn/whatever you want to call it. It's usually what you would use for crewel or tapestry work, but it's got a ton of other applications as well. It's not quite as cheap as the regular cotton floss that we get here in the states is (85p per hank, which is like... maybe $1.50/each?) but considering the rarity... meh?

The best part? They also take online mail orders!
http://www.needlecraftstore.co.uk/

If this sounds cool to you, please check them out, as they are a very tiny hole in the wall store and were amazingly patient with me while I went in there and picked through their stock so many times. :D

May I ask why you were staying in Hemel? That's a super weird place to tourist in! I've been through that way a lot on the canal.

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That Damn Satyr
Nov 4, 2008

A connoisseur of fine junk

Tears In A Vial posted:

May I ask why you were staying in Hemel? That's a super weird place to tourist in! I've been through that way a lot on the canal.

My best friend lives there and was getting married! :) Finding the needlecraft store was a complete accident of luck - they live in KD tower and I could walk from their door to the shop and back in about 8 minutes (minus shopping time). It... wasn't great for my travel budget. >_>;

Tears In A Vial
Jan 13, 2008

That drat Satyr posted:

My best friend lives there and was getting married! :) Finding the needlecraft store was a complete accident of luck - they live in KD tower and I could walk from their door to the shop and back in about 8 minutes (minus shopping time). It... wasn't great for my travel budget. >_>;

Oh cool! Thanks for the tip about the store. Hope you enjoyed your trip to the UK, and that the wedding went well.

If you look out of KD tower to the south you can see the Grand Union Canal. I have a boat that I take up that way occasionally to get to Berkhampsted (The next town along), which has a lot of nice pubs.

That Damn Satyr
Nov 4, 2008

A connoisseur of fine junk

Tears In A Vial posted:

Oh cool! Thanks for the tip about the store. Hope you enjoyed your trip to the UK, and that the wedding went well.

If you look out of KD tower to the south you can see the Grand Union Canal. I have a boat that I take up that way occasionally to get to Berkhampsted (The next town along), which has a lot of nice pubs.

Ha, I spent quite a lot of time in Berkhamsted as well, as that's where my friend works. She's the tattooist at Hair Ink (Sarah) and also a goon. Go get ink from her! :)

That Damn Satyr fucked around with this message at 19:55 on Sep 2, 2018

Sage Grimm
Feb 18, 2013

Let's go explorin' little dude!
Hey thread that I forgot about! I have been busy.


All the cross and half stitching is done, now I've got to do all the fiddly backstitching with black on black and blending thread that breaks apart if you look at it funny. I think I'm up to like 90 movie runtimes on this one so about ~200 hours work? I'm planning on adding them all up afterwards, anyway.


Beauty steadily gets more and more resolved. It's my comfort project when I need to do something else with my free time and don't have something else to focus on. I really should give both of them their faces.


A married couple I'm friends with wanted me to make this for them. They wanted essentially a unicorn farting/pooping a rainbow for what I originally thought was for their bathroom but it may end up in their recent baby's bedroom. Banged it out in a couple weeks watching SGDQ with some small modifications from the original pattern. It's not something I would have done for myself but they were quite happy with it!


And this was the result of realizing I could no longer be present at a friend's wedding due to life changing circumstances. So if my body couldn't be there, I could send something with my heart and soul in it instead! It took the first half of August to get finished and working at it like it was a part time job. Getting it in the frame was fun as it didn't have the depth with the standard back, so I had to jury rig something together so it'll hang nicely. I probably could have stretched it better but it turned out alright.

Buggalo
Mar 31, 2010
After years of stitching I've started to make some of my own patterns using a semi-professional program (Winstitch). I spent the last couple of weeks stitching some of them up and I really like them so far!



I loving love scientific illustrations, particularly of insects since I'm an entomologist, so I made a design inspired by them for the monarch butterfly! I included all the life stages in honor of Maria Sibylla Merian, one of the first known female entomologists and an amazing scientific illustrator.



This firefly has a glow in the dark butt - it's a simple pattern but I think it's adorable and I loved making the wing venation as accurate as I could.



This last one is a quote from the Adventure Zone cause I'm a nerd in multiple ways.

Gonna hit up Ikea or thrift stores for frames soon.

kreyla
Dec 31, 2008
Hey friends, all of your work looks great! I love embroidery, I started doing it in law school to relax. Here's a few of my projects!



The chickens in a cart are one of a farm-themed series of towels for a friend. The kitty face is from a pair of pillowcases I'm currently working on, and the cat is a portrait of my own cat because yes. The viking dudes are from a vintage kit and i just love them.

kreyla fucked around with this message at 04:06 on Sep 29, 2018

there wolf
Jan 11, 2015

by Fluffdaddy
So I got a commission to make a quilt out of some old handkerchiefs and stuff, and part of it are these cats embroidered on old flour sacks.







I think I'm going to try and recreate the one sleeping in the sewing basket for myself.

Angry Pie
Feb 4, 2007
Do you want a piece of me?!
I made this traditional-but-also-stupid (my personal brand) Quaker style sampler for a couple of my friends who are having twins any day now. All the birth announcement cross stitch patterns I could find were just terrible and nowhere near cool enough for these people so I just adapted this sampler instead. The over-one writing was some of the fussiest poo poo I've ever done but I think it looks pretty good.

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.
long time coming



EDIT: here he is smaller, these particular sprites actually look better from a longer distance

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.
Made a quote from a TV show my sister in law likes as a sampler for our family secret santa. Quick and dirty webcam pic 'cause it's the easiest way to upload something without leaving the sofa

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.
thread is ultra quiet but that ain't gonna stop me vomiting my projects onto here anyway :P



suddenly cats
Nov 16, 2006

Cats do not abide by the laws of nature, alright? You don't know shit about cats.
poo poo it's a good thing you did, I completely forgot to share a couple Christmas presents I made for family members this year:




All your projects look great btw! I love that Lesser Dog.

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.

suddenly cats posted:

poo poo it's a good thing you did, I completely forgot to share a couple Christmas presents I made for family members this year:




All your projects look great btw! I love that Lesser Dog.

these are both amazing, are they your own patterns?

suddenly cats
Nov 16, 2006

Cats do not abide by the laws of nature, alright? You don't know shit about cats.

Fatkraken posted:

these are both amazing, are they your own patterns?

haha I wish I was that good at patternmaking, I got the Pikachu pattern from here and googled the other one after I saw it on tumblr one day. I altered the font just slightly because I didn't like the way the original did a few of the letters.

Angry Pie
Feb 4, 2007
Do you want a piece of me?!
I finished this guy last week. Not my pattern (I wish!) but I think it turned out really well.

appleskates
Feb 21, 2008

Find your freedom in the music.
Find your Jesus, find your Kubrick.
I just found this thread! These are things I made in the past few months, when I decided to pick up embroidery again after like 30 years.

this ended up having a quote from a tv show in the middle:


this is my family’s house, that my dad grew up in and still lives in:





WrenP-Complete
Jul 27, 2012

I love how cheerful your creations seem!

Turbinosamente
May 29, 2013

Lights on, Lights off
Finally it's done. After several years of working on it off and on it's done.



Time to move on to the next!

suddenly cats
Nov 16, 2006

Cats do not abide by the laws of nature, alright? You don't know shit about cats.
That came out great! I really think you nailed the color matching.

there wolf
Jan 11, 2015

by Fluffdaddy


Which one of you was this?

Turbinosamente
May 29, 2013

Lights on, Lights off

suddenly cats posted:

That came out great! I really think you nailed the color matching.

Thanks, though I must admit I cheated by running it through PC Stitch 10. The program is pretty good at matching colors, but I have had the occasional screw up so it's always good to check it over afterwards.

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.










I DON'T HAVE A PROBLEM I CAN STOP ANY TIME I WANT I SWEAR



I was housesitting, there's not much to do in mid wales of an evening in the winter...

I actually did a little bit of experimenting while I was doing these, groudon (the big red one) is done in the "normal" way, 2 strands DMC on 14 count. Lucario (blue dogman) is 2 strands on 16 count and the big group are all done on 14 count with THREE strands. I think the extra colour coverage and improved backing colour blocking makes it well worth the extra thread and faff. I don't think I'll be going back to 2 strand on 14 count for anything with high colour saturation, though more muted or technical sprites like Final Fantasy and the like are still up for debate, and 16 count seems to cope with 2 strands a bit better.

Fatkraken fucked around with this message at 17:24 on Feb 22, 2019

suddenly cats
Nov 16, 2006

Cats do not abide by the laws of nature, alright? You don't know shit about cats.
Wow, those look fantastic!! And yeah I've found that I prefer using 3 strands on 14ct aida too, it's not any harder to do and the color coverage is so much better. Plus when you can buy another whole thing of thread for like 50-60 cents a pop at JoAnn, the difference in used thread isn't a huge deal.

Angry Pie
Feb 4, 2007
Do you want a piece of me?!
I think using three strands looks better on 14 count, too, but I find it tangles WAY more than just two, and I don't always have the patience to deal with that. That said, I have a new commission I'm trying to figure out right now and I might try it with three strands when I get around to actually stitching it.

I find for good colour saturation with two strands you need to work on 18 count aida. BUT I'm not really into aida these days, I've been working almost exclusively on 28 ct evenweave because I find the finished fabric just looks so much better. If I'm making something with no white space at all, I'll still use 18 ct aida, but otherwise it's evenweave or linen all the time. I just find the higher thread count fabric looks more polished, for lack of a better word. I'm too blind to work on even 32 ct linen, apparently 28 is the hard limit for my eyeballs.

Sorry for the instagram links but I don't have any other photos handy - this is a no-white-space design of mine on aida: https://www.instagram.com/p/BnsOUDmHaJQ/ and this is one on evenweave (adapted from someone else's pattern) https://www.instagram.com/p/BopoOTGnVqn/ The first has better saturation but because it's black-on-white it's still not perfect. But whatevs, I'm an imperfect person and I still love it.

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.

suddenly cats posted:

Wow, those look fantastic!! And yeah I've found that I prefer using 3 strands on 14ct aida too, it's not any harder to do and the color coverage is so much better. Plus when you can buy another whole thing of thread for like 50-60 cents a pop at JoAnn, the difference in used thread isn't a huge deal.

HAH, £1.08 MINIMUM per skein of DMC in bricks and mortar shops over here (that's like $1.40 at current rates). Fortunately you can get far better rates online for and you can generally get ten skeins for about £6.50 shipped so I'll just be getting a bunch of ones that I'm low on soon (actually I should do that today really, I have a couple colours with basically one length or less remaining).

Also planning on getting a cone of black, they do 100g and 500g weights and you get hundreds of metres for a few pounds which works out at a fraction of the skein price and well worth it for black if you do a lot of outlined sprites like I do

suddenly cats
Nov 16, 2006

Cats do not abide by the laws of nature, alright? You don't know shit about cats.

Fatkraken posted:

HAH, £1.08 MINIMUM per skein of DMC in bricks and mortar shops over here (that's like $1.40 at current rates). Fortunately you can get far better rates online for and you can generally get ten skeins for about £6.50 shipped so I'll just be getting a bunch of ones that I'm low on soon (actually I should do that today really, I have a couple colours with basically one length or less remaining).

Also planning on getting a cone of black, they do 100g and 500g weights and you get hundreds of metres for a few pounds which works out at a fraction of the skein price and well worth it for black if you do a lot of outlined sprites like I do

Oooooof, that's rough. At least we live in a time where online goods are a thing.

That Damn Satyr
Nov 4, 2008

A connoisseur of fine junk

Fatkraken posted:

HAH, £1.08 MINIMUM per skein of DMC in bricks and mortar shops over here (that's like $1.40 at current rates). Fortunately you can get far better rates online for and you can generally get ten skeins for about £6.50 shipped so I'll just be getting a bunch of ones that I'm low on soon (actually I should do that today really, I have a couple colours with basically one length or less remaining).

Also planning on getting a cone of black, they do 100g and 500g weights and you get hundreds of metres for a few pounds which works out at a fraction of the skein price and well worth it for black if you do a lot of outlined sprites like I do

Not to be nosey, but where do you live? There's a very good needlework shop in Hemel Hempstead a bit north of London that has better prices than that, and has the full range of DMC cotton /and/ wool embroidery threads.

I may or may not have dropped almost 70£ there on wool thread when I was on holiday because my buddy lives literally three doors down from the place. <_<

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.

That drat Satyr posted:

Not to be nosey, but where do you live? There's a very good needlework shop in Hemel Hempstead a bit north of London that has better prices than that, and has the full range of DMC cotton /and/ wool embroidery threads.

I may or may not have dropped almost 70£ there on wool thread when I was on holiday because my buddy lives literally three doors down from the place. <_<

nowhere near unfortunately, but I'm perfectly happy getting my threads online, I did that MASSIVE bulk order of literally one of every colour a while back which worked out at about 60p per skein, so all I have to do is keep track of what I have on bobbins and what I run out of and I'm good to go. As long as you buy 5-10+ at a time you can get good prices, I can't imagine it becoming common that I'd be caught short and forced to grab something locally for a tight deadline or something as long as I'm paying attention


Bit of a crazy story for you guys actually, got a facebook DM from a "friend" today; she puts together and sells cross stitch kits (not finished pieces mind you) of pop culture stuff, pokemon and MLP and the like. Between you and me, they're not great kits, the pokemon ones for example are not the sprites but very flat digitizations of some of the artwork and most of them are far too big and over simplified to the point you're stitching gigantic swathes of a single flat colour. she also has *38* different my little pony designs (again, fairly pedestrian digitizations of some of the official art), and hasn't added a new design for about 3 years. In any case, I posted some of the photos from my recent post in this thread on my Facebook yesterday, just sharing with people I know and getting a bit of validation y'know, and I get this message out of the blue

quote:

I'm going to be honest, you selling the completed cross stitches is crossing the line. I feel that this is infringing on my business and I wouldn't dream of selling kits on how to make the other types of things that you sell.
I will be perfectly civil to you at any social gatherings we both attend, but I'm not interested in anything outside that.

I'm not terribly cut up about it TBH, she's a bit oblivious and self centred and we were never really close friends, we'd only ever be in group situations together and she'd dicked over several people who ARE actually my friends, but the flipping entitlement of the thing kinda took me aback. I mean, a) It wasn't a sales post, so far I've never actually sold these things online (I fully intend to but I didn't actually say that in the post), only at events she wasn't even attending with her business. b) finished cross stitch and kits are two totally different markets, c) they're not the same designs and most importantly, d) even if none of the above was the case, just because you do/sell a craft doesn't mean literally no one you know is "allowed" to do/sell anything relating to that craft. I mean jeez!

Fatkraken fucked around with this message at 23:53 on Feb 23, 2019

ilysespieces
Oct 5, 2009

When life becomes too painful, sometimes it's better to just become a drunk.

suddenly cats posted:

Wow, those look fantastic!! And yeah I've found that I prefer using 3 strands on 14ct aida too, it's not any harder to do and the color coverage is so much better. Plus when you can buy another whole thing of thread for like 50-60 cents a pop at JoAnn, the difference in used thread isn't a huge deal.

My only problem with using an odd number of threads is I really like to loop start, so I get frustrated when I can't. Ugh FWP.

Turbinosamente
May 29, 2013

Lights on, Lights off

ilysespieces posted:

My only problem with using an odd number of threads is I really like to loop start, so I get frustrated when I can't. Ugh FWP.

Ever since I saw it in the back of a cross stitch magazine, I too like to loop start when ever possible now. It's really super convenient! Still have to use the old fashioned method for back stitching with a single strand though. Haven't been working on too much lately outside of cleaning out some old kits I've had laying around for a bit. First one was this cute and tiny watermelon (since put in an awkwardly deep frame):

Angry Pie
Feb 4, 2007
Do you want a piece of me?!

Fatkraken posted:

Bit of a crazy story for you guys actually,

I've read this a few times and wow that lady is BONKERS. If I had a new acquaintance who did cross stitch or any kind of embroidery I would be super stoked and want to share work and compare technique and yadda yadda.. I feel like that's pretty normal?? And yeah, kits and completed works are completely different markets, so in addition to being an rear end in a top hat she's also pretty dumb.

Sage Grimm
Feb 18, 2013

Let's go explorin' little dude!
It sounds like she considered herself as a super special snowflake for her work and can't stand the fact she knows someone IN PERSON that does a similar thing. If you were someone I knew did embroidery in my local area, you're definitely not going anywhere until you had shown off your work.

There's so few in my social group. *grumble*

Angry Pie
Feb 4, 2007
Do you want a piece of me?!
do any of y'all use floor stands? I'm really starting to get a lot of repetitive stress in my shoulder from stitching and it's not like I'm gonna STOP, so I'm trying to figure out other ways to work. My only complication is that I can't sit down for any length of time so the stand would have to be tall enough to use while standing (yes, I stitch while standing, thanks spine). I guess if it could clip on to a table that would be ok too since i have a standing desk, but I'd like to be able to stitch somewhere other than in my office.

oh and I just tried loop starts for the first time after I read about it here and this is SO MUCH BETTER than what I've been doing this whole time. A+.

That Damn Satyr
Nov 4, 2008

A connoisseur of fine junk

Angry Pie posted:

do any of y'all use floor stands? I'm really starting to get a lot of repetitive stress in my shoulder from stitching and it's not like I'm gonna STOP, so I'm trying to figure out other ways to work. My only complication is that I can't sit down for any length of time so the stand would have to be tall enough to use while standing (yes, I stitch while standing, thanks spine). I guess if it could clip on to a table that would be ok too since i have a standing desk, but I'd like to be able to stitch somewhere other than in my office.

oh and I just tried loop starts for the first time after I read about it here and this is SO MUCH BETTER than what I've been doing this whole time. A+.

I have a HUGE floor stand thing that a friend gave me that I've never had the willpower (or project to justify) pulling out, but I know some people swear by them. I don't know how it'll work using smaller (<12in) hoops, but it sure can't hurt to see?

HelloIAmYourHeart
Dec 29, 2008
Fallen Rib

Angry Pie posted:

I've read this a few times and wow that lady is BONKERS. If I had a new acquaintance who did cross stitch or any kind of embroidery I would be super stoked and want to share work and compare technique and yadda yadda.. I feel like that's pretty normal?? And yeah, kits and completed works are completely different markets, so in addition to being an rear end in a top hat she's also pretty dumb.

If you like that kind of nonsense you should probably check out r/hobbydrama. That story is pretty mild compared to some of the things that get posted there.

Unrelated, but as for your issue with the three strands tangling--have you tried coating them with beeswax?

Angry Pie
Feb 4, 2007
Do you want a piece of me?!

HelloIAmYourHeart posted:

If you like that kind of nonsense you should probably check out r/hobbydrama. That story is pretty mild compared to some of the things that get posted there.

Unrelated, but as for your issue with the three strands tangling--have you tried coating them with beeswax?

Oooh no I haven't - I just took a commission that isn't due until December so I'll give it a go with that piece. Thanks!

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.
FINALLY started getting my stitching up on Etsy

https://www.etsy.com/shop/krakenkritters

Just a few bits and bobs at the moment but I'll be adding everything I have over the next few days and weeks and hopefully get a sale or two and start gaining traction soon.

Fatkraken
Jun 23, 2005

Fun-time is over.
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lt_kennedy
Sep 2, 2007
Needs Moar Race
Gonna dig up pics of my work in a bit but also a hot tip for budget minded folk is raid your local thrift shop. I've bought whole new kits new and vintage dmc, anchor, semco etc for dollars. Also scored a big bag of dmc flosses for $12 (Aus so like less than 10Usd) and cards - value at about $200+. Also I've gotten whole boxes of carded and numbered flosses and chunks of aida for peanuts. It really is worth the rummage. Even if it's not a kit you're keen on you can repurpose the base materials for your own projects.

I've gotten everything from embroidery scissors to hoops to lap frames to Zweigart aida for 1/5th RRP. When I get to my old memory card I will post some haul photos.

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