Sunflowers and Bees? Yes, please! I saw some seriously cute tiered trays with sunflowers and bees that inspired this design; I'm definitely in love with the look! This pattern features bees and sunflowers above the cursive word "Welcome." It calls for shades of yellow, brown, green, black, and white.
PATTERN DETAILS: The model was stitched on 30ct. Portobello Linen using 2 ply thread. The design uses DMC threads and whole stitches only. The stitch count is 80w x 47h and the finished design measures approximately 5 1/8"w x 3 1/4"h when stitched on that fabric.
RECREATE THE LOOK: Like most of my designs, this one was finished as a mounted flat. Y'all know how happy I get when my hobby crushes all come together in a single piece. Cross-stitch, fabric, cording... I mean seriously. So much to love. Flats are awesome. For those of you who are new around here, this is how the process goes when you do this at home: Cut out 3 pieces of backing board. One is to mount your stitched piece, 2 are to wrap in fabric. I buy my backing board in bulk packs at Amazon, but Hobby Lobby has big sheets of it back near the custom framing section. Tip: Make sure those backing board edges are nice and crisp! Any little bump or imperfection left over after you cut will really show. You'll probably be happiest with the results if you use a dedicated rotary cutter to trim your backing board to size.
Use Aleen's Tacky Glue to layer Warm and White Craft batting on top of the smallest piece of backing board. That's the board that will become the home for your stitched piece. I really like the way a layer of batting smooths out any lumps and bumps underneath the stitching. Nothing will hide big knots, but there is just inherently more "stuff" where you have stitched as opposed to where you have not. A little bit of batting smooths it all out. Once you have glued the batting onto the backing board, trim the batting to be flush with the edges. (I use a rotary cutter to trim the batting as well.) Layer your stitching on top of the batting and wrap the edges around behind. Use more Aleen's Tacky Glue to adhere things in the back.
This is what you'll end up with :).
Tip: This is cross stitch fabric. Use those grid lines to your advantage! If they are warped when you are looking at the piece from the back side, you know they are not even in the front, either. Don't let that glue set until your fabric lines are straight. While I have my tacky glue out, I like to go ahead and put my fabric on the other two pieces of backing board as well. I don't pad these with any batting at all.
However, when the Aleen's is dry, I sandwich them wrong- sides together and use hot glue to join both boards together. Having fabric on both sides gives you a polished front and back when you display the flat after it is finished.
(The black and white gingham fabric I used for the model was done by Danielle Leone for Wilmington Prints. It's from the Hot Cocoa Bar Line, and the SKU is #27602-199.)
Moving on---lets talk about the cording. Cording. Happy sigh. Y'all, I own multiple corders. Sometimes I spin cording in my basement because it makes me feel like Rumplestiltskin. I wander through my house looking for excuses to make more. I love cording. Spend 15 dollars to invest in a corder, and your FFO-ing life will never be the same. We can all be Rumplestiltskin together. This is the cording I made for this piece. I used 6 lengths of the 6 ply DMC thread to get that thickness. I used 3 lengths of DMC 726, 2 lengths of DMC 728, and 1 length of DMC 783. It looks variegated and overdyed when you spin multiple colors together.
Use hot glue to adhere it to the piece.
Tip 1: Work in small sections. Add *small* amounts of glue from the back,and push your cording into place from the front. That way, if any extra glue is going to spill out and become visible anywhere, it spills toward the back where it won't be seen. Small is the key. Small sections, small amounts of glue. Do. not. rush this part. It's worth the extra five minutes to do it right. Tip 2: Plan out where your seams need to be BEFORE you start gluing. If you're going to add a bow, start gluing an edge of the cording where your bow is going to be. That allows you to use the bow to cover the spot where the edges of your cording meet. If you're not going to add a bow, start gluing the polished edge of the cording in a corner. This is the "polished edge of the cording" that I'm talking about:
Here's why.
When you get all the way around the perimeter and need to tuck the excess cording somewhere, having that polished edge butting up to a corner will trick your eye and make your wrap-job look seamless. It is much, much easier to disguise the ends on a corner than if they are in the middle of a long edge, right? I intentionally held it at this angle and zoomed in so you could see where they meet, but if you do it this way on your FFO it is really hard for a casual observer to tell where those seams meet up.
Of course, now that I showed you where the model seams meet, you'll see them in all the photos, but pretend like I hadn't. This is what it looks like with the cording attached.
Lastly, use some hot glue to attach the stitched piece with cording to your gingham fabric sandwiches. Viola! All done!
As always, I am here if you have any questions. Don't be a stranger--I'm happy to help!
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