Are Stitched Bookmarks Relevant Today?

With the shift from print books to e-books, bookmarks will soon be obsolete. Don’t you think it’s silly to promote stitching bookmarks?

No, I don’t. Here are my Top 5 Reasons Stitching Bookmarks Remains Relevant Today

1. Embroidery is relevant in and of itself.

Embroidery is decorative. That’s its purpose. What that decoration is on really doesn’t matter. Among other things, embroidery might decorate bed linens, table linens, jeans, a bracelet, night clothes, underwear, a piece of fabric hung on a wall, a container—or a bookmark.

Embroidery is a craft, a skill, and a tradition. It can be meditative and therapeutic. It can be a form of art and expression. Embroidery is relevant in and of itself.

2. Bookmarks have a place in embroidery history.

Why do we stitch samplers? Is the real goal to practice our needlework? No. We stitch samplers because they are a traditional form of embroidery. Their original purpose as practice pieces fell by the wayside, but their tradition and beauty remain. Bookmarks, too, have a history in embroidery. The purpose of bookmarks may similarly fall by the wayside as more and more of us switch to e-readers and e-books, but their tradition and beauty will remain.

3. Books are going to be around for a while.

Despite the rapid shift to digital books, millions of books exist, and more continue to be printed. They’re not going to disappear overnight. I won’t presume to predict how long it will take, but it will be a while before everyone in the country, let alone everyone in the world, will want to make the switch or be able to make the switch. Some people still use bookmarks.

4. Bookmarks are excellent outreach projects.

Because they can be quick to stitch and finish, bookmarks are perfect teaching projects. Keeping the tradition of embroidery alive by teaching it to others is important on many levels—from connecting people with history to reducing stress and blood pressure to improving learning ability to inspiring creativity—so offering needlework outreach programs is always relevant. Learning to stitch and finish a bookmark results in more than a bookmark at the end: skills have been learned, interest and curiosity ignited, confidence gained, self-esteem improved. Surely no one questions the relevance of these things.

5. Bookmarks don’t have to be bookmarks.

Some people collect bookmarks, not to mark books, but to display them, admire them, and remember their history.

If you let me persuade you to not use rectangular ready-made bookmark forms (not that there’s anything wrong with them—you’ve persuaded me to use them on occasion), a bookmark can be a keychain, a scissor fob, an ornament, a tag, and much more. With everyone using nearly identical e-readers, surely we can all use beautifully-decorated, personalized, self-expressive, hand-embroidered tags to mark our e-readers and their cases.

Yes, stitched bookmarks are relevant today.

Bookmark Tips, Tricks, & Brilliant Ideas E-book

Stitching and Finishing Cross Stitch and Embroidered Boomarks

I don’t want to think about, let alone admit, how long I’ve been saying I would collect and assemble the myriad bookmark tips, tricks, and tutorials I’ve posted over the past five years in The Needlework Nutshell, on the Funk & Weber website, and on the Stitching for Literacy blog. I also don’t want to think about the posts and articles I missed: There are over 1,200 to sift through! Who knew?

I do, however, want to tell you about Bookmark Tips, Tricks, & Brilliant Ideas (and, apparently, I also want to type that over and over. Whose idea was it to give it such a long title, anyway?)

A Work-in-Progress

First of all, this is a work-in-progress. The compound adjective “ready-made,” as in “ready-made tags,” will be properly hyphenated in the Table of Contents in the future (I know you feel the same relief I do), and I will add posts and articles as I continue to uncover and develop them.

Why a Bookmark E-book?

Every year during the Needle and Thread: Stitching for Literacy Bookmark Challenge, I’m peppered with questions about how to finish bookmarks. Invariably, I search the Stitching for Literacy blog for links to useful posts and wish I had an easy way to find tutes from old newsletters.

I like writing the blog and newsletter because it forces me to generate ideas, some of which turn out to be good, especially when critiqued and improved by readers. The blog and newsletter are a sort of public needlework playground.

But blog posts are quickly buried, and newsletter articles, while archived, cannot be easily searched. The good stuff–or suddenly-relevant stuff–gets lost within the mountain of other stuff.

Part of the reason I wanted to redesign the Funk & Weber site was to organize How To tutorials to make them accessible. I wanted to make the Bookmark e-book to organize and make accessible the tips, tricks, & brilliant ideas we’ve shared in the past.

Contents

The e-book currently contains the following:

• Online Resources - links to step-by-step tutorials on the Funk & Weber site.
• Bookmark Forms & Backings
• Hooks & Ribbons - So the embroidery can be visible.
• Stitch Bands - Three ways to finish those short ends.
• Card Stock: Ready-Made Tags
• Card Stock: Stitching Cards
• Card Stock: Self-Made Backing - Includes printable templates.
• Card Stock: Window Bookmarks - Includes printable templates.
• Stitching on Card Stock - A how-to.
• Protective Vinyl Sleeves - We carry them, as does Gayle at Accents, Inc.
• Sisu’s Pocket Bookmark - A step-by-step tutorial.
• Outreach Patterns - Patterns plus the super-quick finishing method we use during outreach Make-It-Take-Its.
• Bookmarks 101 Class - For a more in-depth exploration of finishing techniques.

How to Get the E-book

The e-book is free when you subscribe to The Needlework Nutshell, our free e-newsletter. There are rego boxes all over this site—there’s even one that pops out every seven days and hits you over the head—but just in case you haven’t seen one (trust me, it’s possible), well, this one’s for you:

If you’re a Nut already, and this post is news to you, your SPAM filter might be over-zealous or perhaps you’re behind in reading e-mail (ahem). You know what to do, but be prepared to pay–pay me a compliment, of course!

I hope you find this e-book fun and useful, and I hope you’ll join me and fellow Nuts on the stitchy playground in The Needlework Nutshell.

And now that you’ve gotten your free e-book, click one of the share buttons below and tell your stitchy friends how they can get theirs. Thanks!

Related articles:

• Are stitched bookmarks relevant today?

Window Glaciers

I consider temperatures in the zero to +20 range to be a fine winter temps. Window glaciers indicate the walk to the mailbox will be especially cold.

Even this is tolerable, though, thanks to my awesome ski pants, down parka, and balaclava. It’s the wind that makes the walk challenging. Today, I’ll add ski goggles to my practical and fashionable ensemble.

Here I go!

The Needlework Show Puzzle Contest Winners

Edited November 9. We now have our third winner!

Have you been waiting for news of our Needlework Show puzzle contest winners? Yeah, me, too.

After the show, I asked the random number generator to select three numbers. It did, and I sent notifications to the winners. Two of the three responded promptly, and I hope they now have their prizes in hand. I still haven’t heard from the third winner! Go check your email and your SPAM folder.

I sent an email earlier this week saying she had until Monday to contact me, and if I didn’t hear from her, I’d pick a new winner. So who knows; you might be a winner yet!

And the winners are…

But wait! What was the answer to the puzzle?

The answer is Thank You, and all the words that get placed into the puzzle are things we’re thankful for: Thank you for your patience; thank you for your support; thank you for sharing; and so forth.

And now for the winners…really!

Nadine, from Allen Park, MI
Anne, from Port Williams, Nova Scotia
Winner #3 is…well, we’ll just have to wait and see. If I don’t hear from the first winner #3, I’ll pick a new winner #3 Monday night and update this post when s/he is confirmed.

Our third winner is:

Elaine, from Myrtle Beach, SC

Thanks to Everyone for visiting The Needlework Show and playing our game.

P.S. Thanks, Bonnie, for the nudge!

Fractional Stitches in Cross Stitch

Fractional stitches. Do you know what I’m talking about? Quarter-stitches, half-stitches, and three-quarter stitches.

What is a Fractional Stitch?

Every cross stitch is made of two diagonal legs: a / leg and a \ leg. Either one of those legs—or both—can be cut in half so that one half is one color and the other half is another color. Half of one leg is a quarter stitch. A single leg, sometimes called a “half cross stitch,” is rarely used as fractional stitches are used, though the word “half stitch” is often used to describe both quarter and three-quarter stitches. Got that? Yeah, it’s confusing. I know. A quarter leg plus a full leg is—you got it—a three-quarter stitch.

Fractional stitches are things we see in cross stitch rather than needlepoint, since needlepoint is generally stitched over a single intersection of canvas threads. That’s like trying to stitch a fractional stitch when you’re stitching over one thread on linen. It can’t be done.

Not all cross stitch charts use them, and we never use them in needlepoint, so what’s the purpose of fractional stitches? Details, friends, details. Fractional stitches can smooth a curve; they can add subtle, delicate details and complexity to a design. They are an additional tool in the cross stitcher’s arsenal.

I love fractional stitches when stitching over two threads on linen or evenweave because there is a natural open-hole center for the quarter-stitches to go through. I like fractional stitches slightly less when stitching on aida because I have to poke my blunt-tipped tapestry needle through the center block. That’s not easy. Worst of all, it can be hard to hit the precise center, which drives this perfectionist batty. But they still create smoother curves and more detail, which in the end, for me, outweighs the nuisance of poking through tightly woven fabric and imperfect centers.

How Fractional Stitches are Depicted

Let’s talk about what’s what on a cross stitch chart. First of all, unless you stitch the full leg of the fractional stitch with both colors—which, by all means, you can do—as I said before, we don’t really have half stitches. (Yes, yes. Sometimes half-crosses are used as a filling, but that’s not the kind of use we’re talking about here.) Most often, when a stitch is divided between two colors, one is a quarter stitch and the other, with the full leg, is a three-quarter stitch.

Check out all the fractional stitches in the pattern diagram on the left. This is the wolf ear from the Funk & Weber Designs Portraits of the Wild Life pattern. Lots of fractional stitches here.

Look closely at example 1. The pattern indicates two different colors on either side of a backstitched outline. Those two different colors are quarter stitches, but what color goes beneath the backstitched outline? What color is the full leg of that cross stitch? That’s left for the stitcher to decide.

When I chart patterns, I deliberately remove fractional symbols from beneath the backstitch line because, invariably, the hidden symbols are hard—sometimes impossible—to read and they make the outline look fuzzy. The chart is clearer, if the intention is not, when I leave those layered symbols out. (Ah, but we’ll make the intention clear here. Stick with me!)

In example 2, there is no backstitched ouline, and we have four itty-bitty symbols in a single stitch area, clearly indicating which color is a quarter stitch and which is a three-quarter stitch.

Interpreting Fractional Stitches

If it’s not clear on the pattern which color is the quarter and which is the three-quarter, how do you decide?

The easiest answer is the foreground color or the color of the closer object. Take a look at that wolf ear again. The two color choices in example 1 are the wolf’s ear color (brown) and a background color (purple, as in “purple mountains majesty.” There’s a reason for everything, you know.). The wolf’s ear is in the foreground, covering up the background behind it; therefore, it is the dominant color and should be the three-quarter stitch. The full leg of the cross stitch beneath the backstitched outline is the color of the wolf’s ear.

Let’s consider something more complicated. Imagine you’re stitching a paddle being pulled through the water alongside a canoe. From your perspective (the viewer perspective), the paddle is in front of the canoe, and there’s water in front of the paddle, behind the paddle, and around the canoe. In a fractional-stitch competition between the paddle and the canoe, the paddle wins. The paddle is in front of the canoe; it is the foreground object. This is the stitch that gets the emphasis, the three-quarter stitch. In a competition between the water and the paddle, the water is the winner if you’re showing the water in front of the paddle, but the paddle wins if you’re showing the water behind the paddle, between the paddle and the canoe.

It’s a matter of looking at the two-dimensional picture and thinking of it in terms of three dimensions. The object nearer the viewer (you!) gets the dominant (three-quarter) stitch.

Sometimes, the fractional stitches are in the same plane. In this case, consistency is the thing that matters. Say you’re stitching a waterfall depicted by squiggly vertical lines of different silver/grey/blue colors. I might decide that the left-hand color always wins, getting the three-quarter stitch. This consistency defines the vertical lines which I think conveys the image of falling water. In real life, however, waterfalls aren’t that tidy. You could certainly argue that the water splashes all around and isn’t orderly, thus making the case for random selection of dominant stitches. By all means, try it!

These same rules apply when you’re stitching over one or converting a cross stitch chart to needlepoint: Fractional stitches are turned into whole stitches, and the whole stitch will be the three-quarter or dominant stitch color. You can skip the quarter stitches.

There are bound to be close calls and exceptions to the rules. The final word on the matter is, as always: Do you like it?

I hope this subtracts any confusion you might have had about fractional stitches and what they can add to a cross stitch design. May your understanding of them multiply your pleasure in executing divided stitches.

Oh, like I could resist that temptation!

The Needlework Show

The online Needlework Show is October 20 – 25, and, as has been the case for all of the show’s ten years of existence, Funk & Weber Designs will be there with a puzzle contest!

This is the wholesale trade show that’s open to the public for viewing, so carve out some time to come stroll the aisles. You’ll see new patterns, old favorites, fibers, tools, doo-dads, specials, door prizes, games, and contests.

See you there!

Jumpstart

This is what I woke up to this morning: Snow!

When summer blogging fell to the wayside, I shrugged it off. Summers are for gardening and playing outdoors. I had hoped to continue blogging on a lesser scale, but I was okay with taking some time off, too. I had every intention of beginning again in September, meaning on or about September first. Here it is October 17. I’ve managed a couple of posts over at Ari’s Garden and I’ve posted a few thoughts in the S4L Book Club, but that’s it. And it’s October 17th!

This is nuts!

My excuse is that although the garden was put to bed several weeks ago, I’m still working outside. I don’t regret what I am doing; I only regret that I can’t do it all.

Today I finished hauling topsoil to the new raspberry beds. The area we disturbed when building was a wonky shape. I’ve had a mind to smooth it out a little, expanding the strawberry/raspberry bed, and we’ve finally done it.

The picture was taken before most of the snow melted. The new beds are the ones that look shiny and new. That’s where the hill starts to get steeper, and that’s the area we just dug out. Most of what you see in the picture are strawberry beds. You can see a few raspberries on the left side of the image. Old beds will get new wood…well, sometime. New walls and beds trump spiffying up old ones.

Though we had a decent crop of strawberries this year, I can’t say we’re “swimming” in them yet—especially what with the resident squirrels—and that’s the goal, swimming in strawberries.

We’ve had a terrible time with moose and hares eating our raspberry plants, but we managed to grow some waist- and shoulder-high stalks this summer, and I’m thinking the hare population might have crashed, as it does every seven or so years, after it builds up to an unsustainable high. Unfortunately, our successful raspberries are too much in the shade by the house, so they don’t ripen until September, and then only the earliest berries ripen at all. Sigh.

I’ll transplant a bunch of raspberries to those new beds next spring, and I’ll get rid of the old never-taller-than-twelve-inches raspberries in the lower beds, re-making those as strawberry beds. Runners got away from me this summer, and there will be many babies to transplant next year.

Mike’s building retaining walls/terraces for our cut bank on the other side of the house, and I’ll probably stick more strawberry plants over there. In the picture, on the left side, you can see the tundra stairs that end the just-finished retaining wall behind the house.

When we get to terracing the front slope of the house pad, oh, that will be a sweet, sunny strawberry location. Then—then—we might be swimming in strawberries.

Cross Stitch Over One Thread

When we cross stitch over two threads or on Aida fabric, we make sure the top leg of our crosses slant in the same direction, but how we achieve that doesn’t matter. When we cross over one thread on a plainweave fabric, it matters.

The warp and weft fibers of plainweaves are not “interlocked” at intersections; they simply pass over and under one another. As a result, when stitching over one thread, some stitches can slip and disappear. Yikes!

Being the clever needleworkers that we are, however, we’ve found solutions to this problem, enabling us to stitch tiny, delicate embroideries over one thread on linens and other evenweave fabrics. Come on, I’ll show you.

• 
  

  The Problem with Stitching Over One

  Look closely at the diagram. The warp fiber (that’s the vertical one) is on top in the intersection being stitched. The loop made by the working thread in going from 2 to 3 (dashed line, behind the fabric) has nothing to keep it from sliding up that warp thread, right over the weft (horizontal) thread, until all we see is a tiny stitch between 1 and 4. It’s possible for that tiny stitch to keep slipping and disappear altogether behind the weft thread above it. Oh no!

  There are a number of ways to prevent disappearing stitches. We’re going to look at two here: long arms on the back side and smart loops.

Solution 1: Long Arms on the Back Side

The needle comes up to the surface at 1 and goes down at 2. It comes up at 3 and goes down at 4. And on and on.

The long arms (dashed lines) mean you’re stitching over two threads on the back side, and stitching over the long arms on the return journey further prevents slipping. You don’t strictly have to make long arms on the return trip, but doing so creates a thicker fabric which can be nice. Try it both ways—with and without long arms on the return—and see which you like.

• 
  

  Solution 2: Smart Loops

  Take a look at the first diagram again. Do you see how it differs from this one? Here, the loop created by the working thread as it moves from 2 to 3 goes under the lower thread in the intersection, which happens to be the weft thread in this case. Imagine that loop sliding along that thread (it would slide to the right, the direction it’s being pulled). It won’t go far: The top thread prevents the stitch from slipping under the intersection.
  You could also make this stitch by going 2-1-4-3. The important part is that the loop goes under the bottom thread of the intersection.

• 
  

  Smart Loop, next in sequence

  Now consider an adjacent stitch. Now the weft thread is on top. Notice that the loop here runs in a different direction from the loop in the previous diagram. This is necessary for the loop to pass under the bottom thread in the intersection.

• 
  

  A Row of Smart Loops

  A whole row of over-one stitches might be stitched by following the numbers in this diagram. The needle comes up at 1, goes down at 2, and so on. Of course, there are other patterns that will work, too.

  Note that in the Smart Loop method we’re completing each stitch before moving to the next. If you’re stitching with an overdyed or variegated thread and want to keep both legs the same color, this is the method to use.

Tips for Cross Stitching Over One Thread

Almost any pattern cross stitched over two threads can be stitched over one for a smaller, more delicate piece. While fractional stitches cannot be worked over one, it is possible to adjust the pattern by ignoring them or making whole stitches of them. When two colors occupy two halves of a stitch, consider which color belongs to the object “in front.” For instance, if half the stitch is part of a red flower, and the other half is part of the blue sky, make that stitch red. The flower is “in front of” the sky from the viewer’s perspective, and so is the dominant stitch.

For fabric thread counts of 27 and higher, use one strand of floss for crosses worked over one thread. For counts 25 and lower, try two strands. If backstitching over one with a single strand of floss seems too coarse, try sewing thread instead.

Above all, have fun!

Related Articles
How To Cross Stitch Over Two Threads
Cross Stitching with Overdyed Threads
Cross Stitch Embroidery Fabrics 101

Free Cross Stitch Pattern: American Flag Illusion

It’s that green, black, and yellow time of year again. You know, the Fourth of July . . . Revolutionary War . . . Declaration of Independence. . . Old Glory. And you also know, around here it’s always the time of year for puzzles, illusions, cross stitch, and bookmarks. Naturally, we’re going to put them all together.

Oh, say, can you see two flags?

This is an afterimage optical illusion. When you stare at the tiny dot on the image, you exhaust (or bore) the photoreceptors in your eyes that detect green, black, and yellow. They say, “Yeah, yeah . . . we see it. Move along now.” When you don’t move along, because you’re counting slowly to 60 to make sure the experiment works, the bored photoreceptors kick back and take it easy. “Fool us for 5 seconds, shame on you; fool us for 60 seconds, shame on us.” Then, when you finally stop staring and look at a white surface, an afterimage remains, but because the green, black, and yellow receptors are ignoring you, only the attentive red, white, and blue ones respond.

That, of course, is a highly scientific explanation. If it’s over your head, you might check out this explanation of color aftereffects.

Make Your Own

Download the Two Flags Optical Illusion free cross stitch chart to stitch your own green, black, and yellow American flag. The 3 x 2-inch pattern is perfect for a—you guessed it!—bookmark. You can finish it with plain white backing using the Overcast Backstitches finishing tutorial. After staring at the embroidery, just flip it over to see the afterimage on the back side.

I’m going to further suggest that you make this bookmark for a young reader so his/her reading interest doesn’t flag during summer vacation. Without regular practice, kids’ reading skills can decline, putting them behind when school starts again in the fall.

Canadian friends, make your red columns and maple leaf green and your white columns black.

Harriet and any other Norwegians hanging about, it’s green, black, and yellow for you, too—and you don’t have to stitch 50 French-knot stars!

Brits and Aussies, you’ve got it a bit harder than Harriet, but same colors. Come on, you can do it! And I’d sure love to see it when you do. Send pictures to mail AT funkandweber DOT com.

French knot haters, get over it. They’re cool, and this is a great way to practice. Plus, you can really see them in the afterimage! If you absolutely, positively refuse to stitch French knots, seed beads are your friends.

Others, give me a shout if you need help choosing colors for your flag. I’ll bet we can figure it out.

Happy summer flag-bookmark-afterimage-optical-illusion stitching!

What was that? Oh. Sure. Here’s another link to the free embroidery pattern. You’re very welcome.

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Back in the Blogging Saddle

Whoopsie! I fell off my blogging horse, which I do from time to time, but I aim to climb back up now.

I’ve just been busy, that’s all. And if you can’t guess one of the things that’s keeping me busy, the image on the right should be a hint. When I’m finished here, I’m heading out to plant a bunch of veggie plants that I started six weeks or so ago. It’s been a dry, dry, dry spring here, so I’m watering, watering, watering.

But it’s not just the gardening that is to blame for my busy-ness. I’ve begun a new writing gig that has given me a mountain of new work to tackle over the coming weeks and months. Very fun work, at that. I couldn’t be happier!

When it comes to sharing this kind of news, I’m inclined to take the pregnancy approach: I want to wait until I know for sure this is going to happen before telling anyone, and I guess we’re at that point. Even now, when I’m actually doing the work, I don’t want to get into details. I’ll share details when I’ve actually given birth to the work, and you can take a look at it for yourself.

I’m not the first person to compare writing to giving birth, I know, but there it is. This has been in the works for some time, but as of today, a few things have been accepted, and I’m working on many more.

Did I mention this is super-duper fun?!

The leaves on the trees are just now sprouting, the garden is sprouting, and a new writing project is sprouting. Now, if we can get some of these fluffy white cloud to begin spouting, we’ll be great shape! (Can you believe people let me write when I spout stuff like that?)