How to Teach Yourself to Cross Stitch

Cross-stitching uses small X-shaped stitches to create a beautiful picture.

Cross-stitching is a fun hobby that you can enjoy your entire life. It is a great pastime for periods of time when you cannot move around much, such as hours spent in the car, watching children at sports practices or even recuperating in bed from an illness. Cross-stitching is a simple art, but can be hard to learn if you do not follow a standard procedure until you get used to counting your stitches. In this article, we will show how to teach yourself to cross stitch.

Things You'll Need

• Cross-stitch hoop
• Simple cross-stitch pattern
• Needle
• Embroidery thread
• Pencil
• Paper copy of the cross-stitch pattern

Instructions

How to Teach Yourself to Cross-Stitch

1. 

   Press the inner and outer hoops together around the cross-stitching material. Make sure that the printed design shows within the hoop. You should start out with a simple design that fits entirely within the bounds of a small hoop.

2. Thread your needle with a color that occurs near the center of the pattern. You may have to unravel the embroidery thread so that you have only three strands instead of six. You will thread the needle with all three of these strands unless instructions indicate otherwise.

3. Tie a knot at the end of your piece of thread. This will keep it from pulling through the cloth.

4. Push your needle through a hole in the cloth. You will not need to make holes with your needle, as cross-stitching cloth already has large holes in it.

5. Make a diagonal stitch upward so that you have created a small, slanted line with the thread. Do not sew over any holes.

6. Make another diagonal stitch downward so that you have created a colored "X." This is a cross-stitch.

7. 

   Mark off your stitch on the paper pattern. Use the pencil. This will help you keep track of how many stitches you have left before you need to start making another row of X's. As you get used to cross-stitching, you will not need to mark off every single stitch. Instead you will be able to count the number of stitches in a row, then make that many X's and cross off the whole row.

8. Be patient. Cross-stitching is hard work, but the results are truly beautiful and well worth the effort. Don't get frustrated if you have to remove some stitches while you are getting used to the process. It happens to even the best cross-stitchers in the world.