When juggling cross stitch projects doesn't work

I have been watching a lot of people that say that they would like to get some progress on projects, but then they bounce between multiple projects and then get frustrated that they don’t seem to be making the progress that they would like to get done. They are bouncing between the multiple projects during a week which given everything else in life, it is hard to see any progress on anything this way.

Something that I have found that doesn’t work for me is bouncing between multiple projects either daily or even weekly, because I don’t seem to see any progress on anything and that doesn’t make me happy. Sure, I might be able to get a couple of hundred stitches in a project but when I am bouncing over multiple projects in a week, when I look at the progress for the week, I don’t see much progress at all. 

What I have found is if I can focus on a project for even multiple days at a time or better yet a week at a time, I an see some good progress on the piece. One of the things that I have figured out is that each day of the week I will have a various amount of time to do the stitching so I can’t say I will get the same number of stitches completed each day. A workday of stitching versus a weekend day of stitching without obligations can really vary with the amount of time I can work on a project.

It is amazing how many people have said that they don’t seem to see a lot of progress on their stitching projects and all I can say is instead of bouncing around so much maybe spend a week working on a project and see what progress you are able to make.

I understand that depending on the project the progress from week to week isn’t going to be the same. I know that for me when I pick up a project for a week, I can quite often get just over 1,500 to around 2,000 stitches completed for the week, and I can see some good progress on the project. This is what makes me happy and I am seeing progress on a fewer number of projects.

So, if you are not seeing progress on the projects that you are working on maybe look at how often you are changing what you are working on. If you don’t give a cross stitch project enough time to even see some progress, you aren’t going to feel good after a week when you sit back and say what did I work on this week and what progress did I make on my projects.

 

Cross stitch - where to start on the fabric

One question that comes up in a lot of groups on-line is: I am new to cross stitch and where do I start the pattern? 

There are so many different spots that you can start a pattern and in a lot of cases the pattern itself can sometimes help you determine where to start it. I have my preference, but it does change depending on the pattern because sometimes I just start in my normal spot.

Here are the standard stops that you can start a cross stitch pattern:

Centre – starting right in the middle of your pattern and your fabric means that if you have cut your fabric correctly you will make sure that the design is centered on the fabric which is a good idea sometimes. Some patterns are best to start in the middle and those are patterns that don’t have stitches close to the edge of the design. Some stitch-alongs will start in the middle so that is where you will need to start unless you wait until your preferred location is released.

Upper left corner – I see a lot of people start here and it is one of the corners that is good to start with. In a lot of cases this means that you will be working from the top down on your pattern and that is a good place to start. This is a good spot to start for some stitch-alongs because they normally provide pages in this layout.

Bottom left corner – this is another spot to start, and it is where I do most of my starts. It means that I can work across the pattern of the design, and I can then if using a scroll frame roll it up as I work. This works good for a lot of patterns except for when doing a stitch-along and the design is released from top down or center out.

Upper right corner – I don’t see a lot of people starting here but there is nothing wrong with starting in the upper right corner and working done. This could be a good spot to start if you have the top rows of a stitch along and the right is where you like starting. Some people that stitch in hand will stitch from right to left, especially if they are right-handed.

Bottom right corner – this is similar to the bottom left corner as it means you can scroll your work up when you finish the lower pages of the design. This has the same benefits and challenges as a bottom left corner start.

Summary

As you can see there are five spots that are generally where you can start a pattern, but it is entirely up to the individual where they start. If you get the pattern stitched on the fabric and have enough fabric around the piece for finishing it, you are doing what is right for you. Knowing where to start a project really does depend on the pattern itself as well as who is stitching it.

 

What Nashville Needlework Market means to a stitcher

Of course, if you are a cross stitcher and follow some designers you are going to hear the term “Nashville Needlework Market”. This is an in-person market for designers, dyers and accessories supplies to have the chance to show their projects in person to shops. This is an opportunity for you to support your local cross stitch ship or online shop and purchase the various projects that are going to be made available at this show. It isn’t a market where individuals can attend but it is a great way to ask your local shop if they are going and if they can pick up the various projects that you might be interested in. 

Shops will travel from distances to be able to see the products in person and be able to purchase the items and bring them back to their shops. Designers, and dyers are going to the market so that they can show their products in shops to leave the show with no products remaining because the shops have purchased all their products. As designers and dyers say prior to Nashville Needlework Market, we go to the show with cars and boxes full of product and we hope to leave the show with empty cars, etc because all the shops are leaving with full cars and boxes.

If you are a shop that is going to be attending the Nashville Needlework Market, make sure that you communicate on your site and with your customers that you are going and will do preorders for the various patterns that designers are making available. What I have seen is that there are shops at the last minute say that they are attending Nashville Needlework Market but don’t let their customers know how they can either request patterns to be picked up or what patterns are available for preorder.

For local shops that are attending the Nashville Needlework Market you need to ensure that you have communicated with your customers so that when you go down you have an idea what your customers are wanting to you to bring back. Sure, you might think you know what your customers want to see in the shop, but you also need to figure out what they want from the various designers. There are designers that never release a pdf version of their pattern so being one of the first people that get the pattern would be nice.

Something that you have to think about is maybe last time you went to the Nashville Needlework Market, your customers wanted a certain set of designers but have times changes and the designers wanted are different. The only way you are going to be able to determine this is by asking your customers what they would like to be made available in the shop right after the Nashville Needlework Market. The other thing that you need to do is have a special event the event after you return to showcase the projects that you brough at the Nashville Needlework Market for those that didn’t have a chance to preorder the charts that they liked and hoped you bought back.

WIPGO - is it right for every cross stitcher

The idea behind this challenge is you select either 24 or 25 projects that you want to work on during the year and place them on what looks like a bingo card. You can also set the goal that you want to achieve on each of these projects, so it is up to you how you really work on it. Just before the beginning of each month, two numbers are randomly chosen, and the idea is for you to work on the projects and goals that were chosen. Now for a lot of people they will choose 24 projects so that the number 13 is considered a free space. If you happen to have 25 projects, the month that number 13 is called, you are going to have three projects to work on. The basic idea behind this is to work on moving projects that you selected forward. 

I was someone that wasn’t sure that it was going to work for me in 2025 so I decided to pick four projects, and I was going to see if I could work on them whenever the number was called. I figured I would give it a try for the first couple of months and see what happened. Well, what happened for me was it started to work, and I started to see progress on my various projects. Sure, it was a bit of a challenge to pick up some of the projects, but I also had the ability to switch out a project if the project picked just didn’t work or I finished the project while it was still on the board.

In 2025, I gave myself a goal of 500 stitches on a piece and then a bonus of 500 stitches when it was called but I decided it was just better to work on a project for a week and see how many stitches I could accomplish. My new goal turned out to be at least 1,000-stitches or 7 days on a project. It meant that the projects started to get moved forward and even one of the projects on my WIPGO board got a finish.

Here it is the last month of 2025, and I am currently sitting and trying to figure out my WIPGO board for 2026 and I think I have figured it out or at least I hope that I have. Next year I am thinking that I will have five projects that will be on my list so that I can move things forward. The fifth project is going to be called my “challenge page” project and that will be any project that I started prior to 2026 or mini project. I have also changed my goal for each project to a minimum of 1,000 stitches or 7 days of stitching.

WIPGO has shown me a bit of discipline because I have been able to move projects forward and I haven’t felt the pressure to get lots done at any time and I also haven’t felt the burn out of working on a project for too long and not wanting to work on it again for too long a time. If you are someone that would like to find a bit of structure in your stitching maybe WIPGO is something that might work for you.              

For me, I have found that WIPGO gives me two or three weeks of discipline each month and that helps me move projects forward and hopefully before long I will see some of my projects finished. Let me know if you think WIPGO is something that would work for you. 

What is a stitch-along

 For people that do cross stitch there is a term that we use to explain a project that people are going to be working on at the same time and it is called a stitch-along, or as some people call it a start-along. When people are talking about doing one of these, they may refer to it as a SAL.

There are so many different stitch-along and it just depends on what you want to do. 

Mystery stitch-along 

There is mystery stitch-along where you will receive a piece of the pattern at a specific time, and you can work on that section and then have to wait until the next section is released. This can be a lot of fun, but you have to be willing to work on a project and not know what the final piece is going to look like until the final section of the pattern is released. This can be a lot of fun, but you have to be willing to not know what the piece will look like and sometimes these projects will be a 12-month project.

Specific pattern stitch-along

This one is an easy one to understand because you are given a specific pattern to work on and it can be divided into sections, but you know the pattern before you ever start the stitch along. There are designers that will do this, and they will give you the entire pattern all at once and the pattern is divided into sections so you can either stitch it following the sections or you can stitch it your own way it doesn’t matter.

Specific designer stitch-along

This one is you can pick any pattern from a specific designer, and everyone starts their pattern at a specific time, and it is just a way to motivate each other to get work completed on the design. This can be a lot of fun when people are posting which pattern they are working on as well as where they started the piece.

The idea behind a stitch-along is to help motivate you to work on a piece and try and get it done within a specific time people. The reason why some people call it a start-along is because in some cases if you have a lot of projects on the go you will start the stitch-along but you end up working on a bunch of other projects and the stitch-along piece doesn’t get finished in a timely manner.

For me it is interesting to figure out which stitch-alongs that I want to participate in. I have done most of the different stitch-alongs that I have listed, and it has been fun. I have done both the stitch-along and the start-along because things just got in the way of me finishing a project when it was the stitch along. I recently finished a 2019 Mystery Stitch-Along so what started as a stitch-along turned into a start-along but I at least got it finished. 

A stitch-along can be a lot of fun if you don’t put too much pressure on yourself. If you can’t keep up with the project that is fine because cross stitching is supposed to be for enjoyment so why stress about keeping up with something. 

Cross stitch challenges

 As the new year has come and go, I am going to talk about challenges and why some of them work and some of them just don’t work. I am a crafter and there are a lot of different challenges that you can participate in and some of them are really good, and others may not work for you, and you have to make the decision.

In the past I did try and do a lot of the different challenges however I would start them at the beginning of the year because they sounded good, and I thought they would help my stitching only for me to discover that having such a routine didn’t work so well for me. It is nice that some of these challenges work for some people, and we have to understand that everyone is not exactly the same.

Now here are some of the challenges that I have found, and I will let you know my thoughts about them, and please remember this is just my own opinion.

Stitch to the Moon – let’s strive to stitch our way to the moon. The distance is 238,900 miles and 1 mile = 1 full cross stitch.

•    In this challenge you pick your full coverage projects, and you try and stitch 238,900 stitches/miles by the end of the year. For some people, it might be doable, but that would mean at least 654 stitches every day to achieve that goal. Sure, I probably have that many stitches to do on my full coverage projects, but I know that I couldn’t stitch that many stitches in a year given other obligations.

Focus on a finish – the overall goal of this challenge is to pick a project that you want to finish and focus on it over the next 12 months.

•    Here is a challenge that does start to look doable if I could stay focused and just work on one of my full coverages at a time. My smallest full coverage piece that I have on the go still has just over 28,000 stitches left to do, so that is 2,400 stitches a month to get it done.

25 in 25 – the goal for this challenge is to pick a project and stitch 25,000 stitches on it by the end of the year.

•    Again, this is a challenge that I look at and say if I could just work on one full coverage at a time, I might be able to stitch that much, but again it is just over 2,000 stitches a month on that piece. I might be able to do this if I said

Stitch from stash – the goal of this challenge is to set a budget for your spending (no more than $25 a month) through one half of the year, and that is all you can spend. You can earn money to spend by finishing things, as there is credit for getting things finished.

•    I did participate in this challenge for a couple of years, and I did find that it helped me from just buying patterns, fabric etc. even through I had lots of stuff already in my stash. It was nice to give myself a budget, and it helped me to think about did I really want or need something before I just quickly bought it.

•    What I didn’t like about how some people did the challenge was they would work on a project really hard to almost a finish and would then do a large finish just at the beginning of the half year so that they always had a large amount they could spend. Sure, it was they own money that they were spending, but I know people started to complain but of how people started the time, and it didn’t help motivate others. You are also only going to get a small credit for something that you finished, and it is based on the size of the finish.

WIPGO – the idea behind this challenge is you select either 24 or 25 projects that you want to work on during the year and place them on what looks like a bingo card. You can also set the goal that you want to achieve on each of these projects, so it is up to you how you really work on it. Just before the beginning of each month, two numbers are randomly chosen, and the idea is for you to work on the projects and goals that were chosen. Now for a lot of people they will choose 24 projects so that the number 13 is considered a free space. If you happen to have 25 projects, the month that number 13 is called, you are going to have three projects to work on. The basic idea behind this is to work on moving projects that you selected forward.

•    I wasn’t sure if I was going to do WIPGO in 2025 as I have never done it, but I decided to try and see how I do on it. I selected 4 projects that I want to focus on and each time the project is called I am going to stitch 500 stitches in the piece. I think this is something that is doable given I have 4 large projects that I want to work on in 2025. So, the first two numbers were chosen and now in January I have to add 1,000-stitches to one project because that is how the numbers happen to fall. Now to see how it goes for the rest of the year.

As you can see, I have just shown a few of the cross stitch challenges that are out there for people to try and use to move specially large projects forward. I didn’t even look at all the different stitch alongs that are happening because that is something else that you can do.

Something that is important to remember when it comes to your cross stitch, or any craft, is that it is supposed to be something you enjoy doing. Some challenges because more of a job, and that is when the craft isn’t a craft anymore. So, when you think about participating in any type of challenge that involves something that is supposed to be enjoyable, make sure that the joy remains. We will now see how I do in 2025 trying a different challenge because it just might help me move four projects forward some.

Cross stitchers comparing themselves to others

I belong to a number of cross stitch groups on social media, and I keep seeing the same questions over and over again.  I don’t answer some of the questions because I know that every cross stitcher is different, so why are we trying to compare ourselves to another stitcher?

Questions that I see so often in various cross stitch groups

1. How many stitches do you do a day?

I think it depends on how long you stitch each day and the project that you are working on. If I am working on a monochrome piece, I can get a lot more stitches in compared to a project that has a lot of colour changes. So, I don’t have a good answer for this question. I stitch when I can and enjoy seeing what I have been able to get done in the day. I normally look at my progress for a week instead of a day. Not only that, but I take pictures of the projects that I worked on in that week so that I can see the change.

2. It took me almost 2 hours to stitch 100 stitches of confetti, why am I so slow?

If you are working on a heavy confetti section, it can take a long time to get through that little section. Each time you must change a colour it takes time away from the adding a stitch to the project.

3. How can I stitch faster?

Cross stitch isn’t a race, and you should enjoy the time you have to do a project. I will not compare my stitching time to anyone else, because everyone has their way of stitching. You will notice that you seem to stitch faster when you don’t have a complicated pattern or when you are using one colour in a large area.

4. I can see the background fabric when I finished stitching, what can I do to improve this?

This is one of the comments I can a lot, and what I always say it to look at the project from a minimum of 3 feet away. When we are stitching the piece, it is close to our face, but when it is finished and displayed, we aren’t looking at it as close.

5. The pattern calls for 25 count fabric, but I don’t want to use that fabric, can I change it?

The simple answer to this question is yes, you can change the fabric that you are going to stitch on. One time that changing the fabric size isn’t the best is if your pattern is using beads and the specific beads need to fix into a certain area. Another time when changing the fabric size might not be a good idea is if the project is to fit into a specific item for finishing.

These are only a few of the questions that I regularly see in the different cross stitch groups. The biggest thing I can say is that cross stitch is a hobby that we should be enjoying doing and if we are comparing ourselves to someone else that can be taking away the joy of the craft.

The one thing that I have done that has helped me be a lot happier with my stitching is not comparing the number of finishes that I have each year with someone else. I know that I like stitching larger projects, so I am not going to get as many finishes as something that likes to stitch very small projects. My cross stitch is one of my hobbies, and it helps me de-stress and stitch my mind back together, so that makes me happy.