Radical Cross Stitch

It doesn’t take long when you get into Radical Cross Stitch to start leaving needles everywhere, especially in the arms of couches. My partner had started to make some subtle observations about the hazards of sitting on the couch. So when I saw this wonderful tutorial at Crafting Chaos I knew I had to make myself one. And I thought it was about time I made myself something. So I’m calling this my own Mother’s Day present.

I’m quite proud of this one, I think it’s really ‘pretty’ and I used mostly scrap materials to make it.

The materials I used were plastic canvas (the small holed type), wool, binding and craft glue. This is the wool. It was left over from the End Racism Hoodie and I really like it.

Since the canvas I was using had a small grid size, my stitches covered two rows at a time. I shifted each row over a stitch to ensure holes were well covered.

I also decided to change direction every three rows to give the pattern a bit of variance. I can’t show this in pictures but the pattern is quite wavery (if that’s a word…) when the canvas moves.

I also found the canvas showed a bit on the edges and I picked up some binding from an Op Shop (Thrift Shop to you USAliens) with the intention of sewing it onto the edges. But that was way too hard and slow for me, so I cheated and glued it.

I left the binding on the inside glued open wide so it left with a bigger and flatter surface to work with.

Leaving a small edge on the outside.

And of course since I’ve already started using glue, there was do way I was going back now. Also the glue had made the material really stiff so sewing through it was going to be a real bitch….

So I got my lining fabric and ironed it into shape and then glued it onto the binding tape. Of course remembering to attach my ties first (more on that later…)

Then, ta-da!

And inside

Now the bit I wasn’t too smart on was the tie. I was way too excited about attaching the liner! Firstly I made the loop too big so I decided I would just have to tie it all in a bow until I could figure something out. But then I pulled too hard on one end and it came out ’cause I hadn’t glued it properly. So yeah… will work on that. But it looked pretty for a while!

So that’s my new needle case! Let’s see how many needles stay in the couch now!

Thanks again Twilight for the great tutorial xox