“Mama’s Bukid” …
Here’s what it looked like last week…
Mama’s Bukid
8/18/2016
Here’s what it looks like now..
Mama’s Bukid
8/25/2016
I was listening to Hobbies Up To Here Podcast recently and in one of the episodes (I can’t remember if it was this last one or the one before) Dori and Katie were talking about cross stitch projects and how the back is ‘supposed’ to look. I know I heard of this from my grandma when she first taught me how to cross stitch. But both her and my concentration then was to stitch evenly, make it look nice, and finish things. Now that I feel like I’ve gotten into a groove and I’m working on my project pretty consistently, I think I can up my game and start working on my technique so that the back looks good too.
If you didn’t hear the podcast and have no idea what I’m talking about, the idea is that a good cross stitch is one where the back looks just as good as the front. I believe all the loose ends are tucked into the project and there aren’t rat’s tails or nests all over the place. I don’t know all the details so I think I’ll do some poking around the internet and find out what this really entails. In the meantime, here’s the back of my current project. Please don’t judge me too harshly – remember, I never cared about my back and I’m only just looking into it now. I think as a maker, hobbyist, crafter, I’m always looking at ways to improve my technique. I don’t know if making the back look nice will translate to the front and if it really matters, but I’m going to be working on this project anyway so I might as well as look into it. I know early on in my cross stitch days, I tried to make the back look nice and I got frustrated and gave up. At that time, I decided that I didn’t care about the back and that as long as the front looks good, we’ll leave the tails where they were. That may very well happen again. We’ll see! 🙂
Mama’s Bukid
… The back…
8/25/2016
Melanie
My Goal for 2016 for cross stitching is to get the “welcome” project done and get started on my farm piece.
When I used to cross stitch, I learned that same philosophy — that the back had to look as nice as the front. I still chuckle when I remember going through some of my aunts’ work after they had passed away. My mom could always identify one particular aunt’s work — “her back was always messy”. The only reason I wanted to clean up my back was so that the tails didn’t show through to the front after framing, etc. Your project is coming along nicely!
I agree about the tails showing through the front! I never really paid attention to it but when I got the Welcome project back from the framers, I could see some of the darker thread from the back. That’s what I started thinking about as I continued to work on Mama’s Bukid. 🙂
My mother always said that about the inside of a garment looking as nice as the outside. Right, Ma. =) This looks fabulous from the front, and it looks almost finished. If the back isn’t showing, I wouldn’t give it too much thought. =)
Thanks Susan! I’m willing to try it but if I get frustrated… well, I can stop and do what I’ve always done. 🙂