Thursday 9 September 2021

My in progress craft project - a cross stitch map of places that I've visited

I thought that I would share an update on my very long-term craft project - a cross stitch map showing all the places in the world that I've been lucky enough to travel to. I've had this kit for many years but it is still available to purchase, you can buy the one that I have here - Cross Stitch Map (affiliate link) - and it is also available as a mini version.

It's basically just a piece of stiff cross stitch fabric with a wooden frame at the top and bottom and a hanging loop. The map is printed onto the fabric so it doesn't follow the squares exactly, so when it comes to stitching around the edges of countries you have to do a bit of fiddling with half and quarter stitches to make it look right. It comes with a very small amount of embroidery thread but nowhere near enough to stitch all the countries - I used up all the green thread just stitching Australia. Luckily I have a huge stash of thread to work through!

Suck UK cross stitch map in progress

I like to think that I'm fairly well travelled, but when I had stitched on all the countries that I've visited it still looked rather blank and boring, so I decided to fill in the background of the map with small images to represent different countries, along with different shades of blue for the sea.

This turned out to be a larger undertaking than I expected, hence why it has turned into a very long term craft project! I'm currently working on boxing in the outlines of the countries, like you can see here around the coast of America, and leaving gaps for different pictures that I've not designed yet.

Cross stitch personal travel map

I think I have a few years of work left on this project, but at least I can hang it up and enjoy it while I'm still working on it! I have a big long list of ideas for more mini images which I'm looking forward to working on once I have more of an idea of the spaces that I'll have left.

Stay tuned for further updates, and maybe one day I'll actually be able to share a photo of the completed project!

Cross stitch map personal travel in detail

I have made some of the designs on my cross stitch map available as free patterns - have a look at the links below!

Free Disney style castle cross stitch pattern



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