With all the different arts and crafts I like to pursue, sewing is one I don’t do very often – but also one I would love to get into more. My previous sewing experience is rather humble. I made a Pusheen cat shaped pillow for my siter a few years ago, and I did a couple of simple embroidery and cross stitching projects at school, but that’s about it. However, I recently managed to start (and complete!) a small cross stitch design. And I can’t wait to do another.

I bought this little kit as an impulse purchase when queuing for the tills at Hobbycraft last year. It was cheap and I had wanted to try some sewing/knitting/crocheting for a long time, so it immediately caught my attention. It was also shortly before my flight back home for Christmas, and it seemed like a perfect little project to do in air – I always get incredibly bored when flying and anything to kill the 2 hours sounded like a good idea. 

I opened this cross stitch kit at the airport… and that’s when I realised that it wasn’t exactly what I’d expected. See, I’ve done one cross stitch project in the past. It was in primary school, and I successfully completed a picture of a cute bear. In fact, I still have it, framed, back in the family home. 

There was one significant difference between that old cross stitch project I’ve done and this mini fox kit. The design I did as a child involved cross stitching on a printed canvas. The cross stitching fabric (aida) had the bear painted on it, which made it easy to sew without much thinking. The fox kit contained a blank canvas instead, and a separate guide on a piece of paper. I was confused and didn’t know how to read that diagram. And the more I looked at it, the more confused I got. I eventually decided it required more mental capacity than I had at the moment and I packed the kit back into its box where it remained until last week. 

Recently, I finally decided to give the kit another go. I still couldn’t figure it out by looking at the provided diagram alone, so I ended up doing the obvious thing. I Googled “how to cross stitch” and landed on this page. That was exactly what I needed. I learnt about the proper techniques of starting and finishing a stitch and I learnt the right order of moves. I also learnt about the strands in the skeins, which was a bit of a “Eureka” moment. I found the centre of the design and started cross stitching. 

After completing the first color block (the torso of the fox), I was fairly satisfied with how it looked. For a first try at cross stitching, it turned out reasonably tidy. I was a little dubious though, as the stitches looked more like tiny knots than crosses. I did a second round of Googling and realised that what I assumed was stitching with two strands of thread was in fact stitching with four. Oops. It was too late to change it all at that point and I quite liked the way it looked anyway. I actually have a second mini cross stitch kit that I bought at the same time, so I’ll have a chance to do it the right way next time. 

I enjoyed the process of cross stitching a lot more than I thought I would. After the initial confusion and getting overwhelmed with an empty canvas, it became relaxing once I got into the swing of it. 

Everything came together really nicely once I added the black outline and details.

Despite avoiding sewing for years and thinking it would be difficult and I wouldn’t enjoy it, I actually ended up loving this project. It was a little confusing to begin with, but a few minutes of research were enough to learn enough to get going. From that point, the whole process was relaxing and rewarding. I loved seeing the fox come to life, and the final touch of adding the black details really brought it all together. I shied away from sewing for years, but I think it will become part of my go to favourite crafts now!

Also see:

• DIY