One of my favorite things about being back in the US is being able to use the library again. In Japan, libraries are also popular, but my Japanese is definitely not up to reading most books. After only a month back, I’ve already gone to my local library three times. While it might not have the most extensive catalog, I have found a few embroidery books to add to my reading list. First up, A Winterthur Guide to American Needlework by Susan Burrows Swan. I’ve written about my love of historical research and cross stitch before, but I’d love to write a few posts that help others who’d like to do ..read more

Hi everyone, First, I’d like to thank everyone who has left comments, kept visiting, and read my posts during the past year I’ve been pretty inactive. 2022 was…a lot. I’m still going through a lot in my personal life and probably won’t be feeling up to writing about it publicly for a while, but I did want to post a quick update. As of February, I’m actually back in the US again, which is good, but it was difficult getting here. I’m no longer with my husband, which is also a good thing. Things had been rough the past few years, and he ended up becoming abusive. While my kids and I went through ..read more

I decided to start another WIP. I guess having most of my WIPs in transit has me feeling lonely? Ignoring the fact that I have not finished a project in months, I therefore decided to embark on a new start that is fitting of my new home. It also happens to be my first all silk cross stitch thread project. The New Cross Stitch Piece in Question The new piece I’m working on is called ラプンジェルのフレーム which roughly translates to Rapunzel’s Frame. The pattern is from Vol. 30 of Stitch Idees, an older issue from 2019. I had to backorder this after seeing sayo.stitches gorgeous version of this piece over ..read more

In the cross stitch community, backs can be a source of pride, an ugly shameful secret, or a glimpse into how another stitcher tackled a piece. I want to preface this post by saying I am firmly in the camp that all backs are beautiful! I don’t think having a knotless back makes you any better of a stitcher, nor does a messy back full of mixed colors and strange jumps means you’re a “bad stitcher”. The back of cross stitch pieces will often look different depending on a few things. How many colors you’re using, what kind of effect you want to achieve, and how you prefer to stitch. I’m going to ..read more

K’s Creations Z-Frame, a Lap frame for cross stitch or embroidery. Wow, it’s been a hot minute. I would apologize, but this blog is supposed to be for fun and I’ve been doing anything but lol. I severely underestimated the amount of work taking care of the kids by myself, working part-time, and preparing for an international move would take. But it is what it is and I’m glad the home stretch is finally here. The husband is back in the country and we will all be moving to Germany on January 17th, FINALLY. So back to cross stitching. I recently bought this K’s Creations Z-Frame back in August ..read more

When you’re feeling a bit down is there anything more helpful than a new project? I think not. To help distract myself from all the stress going on I feel like I’ve been starting a new piece every week recently. My latest start is on the Stitching Book Club’s Pride and Prejudice, a beautiful piece that will help me use up some of my 5 skeins of DMC 732. I bought a new piece of linen from Number12Stitch Co in the color Duck Egg. Because I’m a glutton for pain, I decided to stitch this on 40 count. If you’ve ever stitched on 40 count before, I hope you can understand my reasons for this post. I ..read more

This summer was not the easiest for me. After almost 12 years together, my wonderful cat Panko suddenly died of an assumed heart attack. She helped me through so many life changes and moved with me to 3 different countries. I’m glad she didn’t have to suffer another move, but the shock of losing her kind of knocked the wind out of my sails for a while. On top of that my husband is now in Germany preparing for our move there, which leaves me here in Japan with our kids by myself. In a pandemic. And right at the beginning of summer vacation. Suffice it to say I didn’t get much stitching done in ..read more

My treasured DMC stitching box, filled with patterns, and where I store most of my specialty floss. If you are new to sewing/stitching, you might be wondering what products are most useful to have. Some of us have limited space (my entire apartment is 70sqm/700sqft for 4 people) and can only have so many items. Others are overwhelmed by all of the amazing options there are nowadays. Making sure you get good quality products that you will get a lot of use from is important. I recently needed to buy some replacement notions so I thought I’d give a few recommendations for newbies and seasoned sti ..read more

Finish Monday! I needed this too, it was just the worst lol. I woke up and forgot to change the coffee grounds, so I drank water that had a slight essence of coffee first thing and it was not the best start to my week. Getting a finish in later that day helped. I made a wifi sampler a few months ago and finally completed my own, just a few months before we move! When we no longer have the wifi network I’ll upload pictures of the full stitching but for now I have blurred the password and stuff. This is technically accessible to anyone sooooo… yeah. Fresh off the hoop and is it that obvious ..read more

I recently bought a Q-snap. In over 10 years of stitching and I NEVER had one until now! I don’t know how I lasted this long other than the fact that Q-snaps are American and I haven’t seen them overseas much. I believe that is changing if the latest issue of Stitch Idees is any indication, but regardless, I bought mine on 123stitch.com. I have a dedicated embroidery hoop holder, but I don’t have a frame that will fit a Q-snap. I find it easier to stitch without the frame with Q-snaps, but I still worry about getting my fabric dirty. I decided I needed to figure out how to make a grime guard ..read more