Cross stitch is a very simple form of embroidery/needlework that generally involves the use of “evenweave” fabric to make X’s to form a pattern or design. There are two basic types - counted or stamped. With counted cross stitch, you start with a blank piece of fabric and a chart of your pattern. With stamped, the design is printed on the fabric for you, and you simple stitch in the colored areas.
I’ve been doing counted cross-stitch since I was a child. It was a great way to pass the time while living in the middle of nowhere and through long winters on the farm. Today, it serves as a meditative activity that passes my time on something other than TV or my phone and also produces something beautiful in the end that I can keep or give away.
History
Apparently cross stich was done as far back as the 6th century BC. During the Tang Dynasty, cross stitch was popular in China. The first printed pattern book of cross stitch was made in Germany in the 1500s. Cross stitch “samplers” were first created using linen. These samplers were intended to teach young women how to sew, but they also helped them memorize numbers, letters, and Bible verses. Here is an example of a sampler:
Cross-stitch is part of the sewing traditions of many areas around the world, including the Balkans, Middle East, Afghanistan, Colonial America, and Victorian England. Modern U.S. cross stitch was introduced in the 1960s when women had more leisure time. (We don’t have any now, but somehow it’s still popular!)
The earliest known cross stitch sampler made in the United States was made by Loara Standish, daughter of Myles Standish, in 1653.
Along with samplers, cross stitch was traditionally used to decorate household items like linens, tablecloths, and dish cloths. Today, people make cross-stich pieces as their own work of art and frame them or make them into pillows or other items.
Tatreez
I joined a couple cross stitch groups on Facebook about a month ago and someone posted about tatreez, the Palestinian version of cross-stitch. I was drawn to it as a way to feel connected to this people who are being decimated. In my small way, I can help keep their culture alive that is being destroyed out from under them, quite literally.
What sets tatreez apart from other forms of cross-stitch are the colors and patterns used that are indigenous to how and where Palestinians lived. For this reason, in 2021, tatreez was added to the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
I’m following several Palestinian women on Facebook who practice this art. They are, thankfully, not living in the midst of Israeli bombing. Here is one of them:
Two of the women have a podcast together about “tatreezing”, as they call it. I love that I’m forming a community of cross stitchers online - especially a multi-cultural one. With any luck, I can form one in person, too.
I was on a Palestinian poet's Facebook page, and he had posted a cross stitch project with symbols that represent each city in Palestine.
Historically, each village in Palestine had their own tatreez patterns. The local landscape (trees, birds, animals) was inspiration for many of the patterns and motifs used. After the violent displacement of Palestinians during the 1948 nakba, people were living together in refugee camps, and the styles of tatreez became less distinct. Later, woman began incorporating the Palestinian flag and its colors into tatreez as an expression of the identity, heritage and resistance of Palestinian women and their dedication to preserve the ancient culture.
Someone in the comments linked to an incredible website with a huge list of tatreez symbols. It's epically epic, and I'm going to use that website to design my own tatreez pattern. Their website was designed as a resource for practitioners of tatreez. It states, “Tirazain is committed to preserving and facilitating the transmission of culture by placing tatreez knowledge in Palestinian hands.”
One of the things tatreez is used for is to make ornate pieces to attach to the thobe, an ankle-length, long-sleeved gownlike dress worn in Muslim countries in the Middle East. Heres’ an example:
Mexico
Palestinians are not the only ones who incorporate cross stitch into their clothing.
Mexico is also a country that adds colorful embroidery and cross stitching to traditional clothing.
When I went to Mexico with my high school Spanish class, I brought back this cotton dress with hand-stitching around the bottom. This photo is blurry, but I remember it to be cross-stitch and not traditional embroidery.
I love that I’m reconnecting with this craft and that it has such a rich history around the world. I plan to find ways to use it for activism. I might become one of the artists in Bridge to Rutland’s Arts Marathon and have cross stitch be my medium. Then I could sell or auction off the finished product to also donate to the them.
(By the way, I’d kill for all that thick hair today!)
🧿 Life Observations
What is an artist?
I've been asking myself that a lot lately.
Here's what I decided:
You don't have to be great at your art to be an artist. And in fact, who decides what great is anyway?
Also, you don't have to make money at your art to be an artist.
I also decided that trying too hard to make money from my art might make me hate my art. I'd rather love my art than make money from it.
In a perfect world, you can do both, but the world is not always perfect.
Having said that, I have undying gratitude for those who have supported my art monetarily. It’s very hard to make art while you’re trying to support yourself financially. And a transition to supporting yourself fully as an artist is best done with a trust fund, wealthy parents, or a partner with a stable income. I am happy being a part-time artist and hope to continue making art as long as I live.
The Christmas Cactus That Could
I had written this Christmas cactus off for dead because it just didn’t stand up straight or grow much, probably due to the birds and squirrels that liked to dig in it.
But then last week, I saw that it was growing me a flower! So I brought it in the night it was supposed to get into the 40’s here, and a day later it gave me the most goregous flower I’ve ever seen.
I cannot tell you how happy this made me!
I’m going to try my hardest to nurture this plant so it will grow a little every year.
Good Design
A friend of mine followed a link in one of my previous posts to order me a teacup from Japan. The teacup was so “from Japan” that they probably made it to order.
My love of good design was satiated by the care they put into just the packaging of the item. They included a letter on some kind of natural fiber paper explaining that the item was handmade by an artisan and that the purple cloth (“furoshiki”) used to wrap the box was a 1200-year-old tradition.
The cup itself was, of course, gorgeous. It has gold metalic paint and floral design.
📑 Project Updates
My Personal Website
I'm been overhauling my elsiegilmore.com website. I'm freshening it up and incorporating Hugmobile stuff and new art I’ve made. I might get rid of the separate Hugmobile site so eventually I'll have less to maintain, but I haven't 100% decided yet. I'm trying to focus my time and attention and have fewer things to maintain. But all the Hugmobile content would still exist, just in a consolidated place.
The Universe gave me a great nod when I was contacted by an employee at a company that used to be my client. I thought they were closing, but I think they're going to hire me back on after the original owner had retired and ended my services.
The employee who contacted me said she'd been looking for me online and came across elsiegilmore.com and absolutely loved it and thinks I'm the kind of person she'd love to hang out with if she ever came to Florida.
That was a lovely thing to hear.
Cross Stitch
Here is my progress on the tatreez piece.
The colors are so evocative of the Middle East. It’s amazing how regional colors can be. Mexican colors are so much brighter, more like primary colors. I have to imagine this has, in part, to do with what materials they have to make dyes with.
I'm starting to plan for my next pattern, which is from a Russian designer. This one Etsy store has loads of Russian designed patterns that I simply love.
I'm going to take a risk on trying the first one with linen, which I hear is much different to work with. For one thing, instead of switching over only one square, you stitch over two. So basically stitching on 28-count linen (28 squares per inch) over two squares is the same as on 14-count aida over one square, which is what I'm doing right now with the tatreez piece.
Linen has a very cool look, more like regular fabric. As opposed to aida, which has a very specific, gridded look. Less like normal cloth.
😥 What's Keeping Me Up at Night
Gaza Updates
Nothing has changed. People are starving. Children are dying.
The U.S. senate voted that no aid to Israel should be dependent on whether they're breaking humanitarian laws.
Biden is digging in on bombing Yemen even though he admist it’s not helping.
Netanyahu is desparate to keep the war going to avoid accountability for not only the war crimes he’s committing but the other crimes he was on trail for before all of this started.
This legislator from Ireland did not mince words about what's happening, and she's my new hero. Click to watch the video.
⏰️ Currently
💼 Making it a priority to do more business networking
🪐 After a period of contracting, I'm beginning to feel more space opening up
😊 Feeling very content with who I am
Thanks for sharing the multicultural aspects of cross stitch, and your other shared observations.