Cross Stitch Wall Hangings

Step One: Pick Your Design

There are tons of designs for cross stitch wall hangings, from Celtic-inspired designs to Christmas patterns. Choose a design that will go well with your existing décor or that will fill a need in your holiday decorating scheme.

Don’t choose a design that you don’t like. That seems pretty basic, but it’s easy to be tempted by something that looks cute in the crafts store but doesn’t really fit with your style.

Make sure you decide where you’re going to put the cross stitch wall hanging before you decide on a pattern. That way you know what colors to use in your design. For instance, if you have a room that already has a lot of green in it, you might want to play off that by using a design with a lot of green, or hanging the wall hanging with a green ribbon. In other words, the design of the cross stitch wall hanging should be harmonious with the room it is going into, both in terms of design and color.

You can buy cross stitch wall hangings that are in kits or come up with your own design. Look through your cross stitch books and patterns on the Internet for inspiration or design you could convert to a wall hanging. Get creative and combine elements from different patterns, take things out, or stitch a pattern up in a different color to get the look you want.

Step Two: Stitching

Now the fun part: stitching up your cross stitch wall hanging. The good news here is you don’t have to be really careful making the back of your work look nice, because wall hangings have a piece of fabric on the back that covers up all your messes.

If you have purchased a kit, you will probably have all the embroidery floss and other supplies that you need included in the package. If you’ve struck out on your own, make sure you buy enough floss in the colors that you need to get you through the project. There’s nothing more frustrating than nearly finishing a project and running out of a crucial color.

As usual with cross stitch projects, you’ll want to start in the center of your pattern and the center of your cross stitch fabric. This ensures that your pattern will fit on the fabric. You’ll also want to work in sections and try to resist the urge to do all the stitching in one color before going on to the next. No matter how well you think you can count, you’re bound to mess something up with this method (trust me).

Step Three: Finishing

If you purchased a kit to make your cross stitch wall hanging, it probably came with a piece of backing fabric to finish the project. If you’re designing your own wall hanging, you’ll need to pick out fabric that looks nice with the stitched piece and with the rest of your décor.

The backing fabric serves as a kind of border for your cross stitch design, so a little of it will show (or a lot, if you use it as a real border). It’s worth it to spend some time to find a fabric that you like.

Cut your fabric a little bit bigger than the size you want your wall hanging to be. If you want a real border, leave a couple of inches all the way around. Fold over the edges of the fabric so that the raw edges are inside. Ironing the edges flat and straight will make this much easier.

Use your sewing machine if you want to sew about three and a half sides together, with the right sides together so that the proper sides will be showing when you turn it inside out. Stitch the rest closed by hand. If you don’t have a sewing machine, you can do this all by hand.

Add two pieces of ribbon to the top of the cross stitch wall hanging by tacking the ribbon to just the back of the wall hanging. You could also sew the ribbon into the seam at the top of the wall hanging. Tie these two pieces together in a bow at the top and hang as you like. You can also use just one piece of ribbon, string or other hanging material looped over the top of the wall hanging. Enjoy your new piece of wall art!