My mother hated embroidery, but made sure I learned. My grandmother never sat down without either a crochet hook or her knitting needles in her hands, and made sure I learned those. I was taught XS in college -- the only useful thing I learned there! -- by a dorm mate. What I liked about it was that I DIDN'T have to do the pattern exactly as designed. For example, I am an only child, and it used to drive me up the wall that I'd find pieces with a lovely verse appropriate for my cousin, but ruined by having the word Sister stamped across the top. Similarly, I didn't call my granny either Grandmother or Grandma, so I couldn't make her any of the stamped stitcheries intended for grandmothers (I tried once, but could not get the blue ink to wash out completely, so there was still a very visible shadow of Grandma where I'd tried to alter it). With XS, I could take a sister pattern and make it say cousin, or a grandma pattern and make it say Oma. In my stash is a lovely "wedding sampler" for my cousin and the man she never intends to marry. They've been a committed couple for years, and it would be nice to honor them as such. I'm going to stitch the picture with their names under it, and skip the part that says married and the date. I couldn't do that with a stamped piece. Moreover, I can just take small portions of a design and use them. I bought an embroidery kit I didn't want to do because there was a beautiful flower I wanted to trace and use on something else. The carbon paper got awfully messy and I ended up with hard-to-remove black smudges on my white fabric. Unlike crewel, where you can never find the wool except in kits, XS allows me to use any color scheme I want. Also in my stash is a picture of a redheaded woman in a pink dress. I'm a redhead, and I know better than to wear pink! When she's done and on my wall, she will be in my favorite color: turquoise. The "un-wedding" sampler I'm doing for my cousin is charted in blue; her favorite color is purple. Since I don't need a hoop, it's a lot more portable than embroidery. I can carry a Christmas ornament in even my smallest handbag. All of those are the things that got me hooked on XS. _______________________________________________________________ Sponsored by Beakers Graphic Designs http://www.probe.net/~beakers/ecsp.htm The Xstitch Home page at http://www.probe.net/~beakers/xshome.htm Mary Joseph - XStitch List Moderator - [EMAIL PROTECTED] Monica Sudds - XStitch List Administrator - [EMAIL PROTECTED] =============================================================== To unsubscribe TO: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message: unsubscribe XStitch
