Cross-Stitch Heart

Welcome to another TGIFF party! It's time to celebrate our finishes and this time I have a finish that has been waiting a long time for its turn to come. The actual making didn't take long, but I've been thinking about making this new version of Cross-Stitch Heart for years.

I first made Cross-Stitch Heart for Make Modern magazine back in 2018. When I designed it, I was on a bit of an asymmetry kick, so this is how that original version looked. I gave this quilt to my Nanny for her 80th birthday, and it came back to me this spring after she passed away.

Almost immediately after making that version for Make Modern, I wanted to make another version using a different fabric for each block to emphasize the X shape that gives the quilt its name. Using different pinks makes it look so much more like a heart made of cross stitches.

Then, about a year ago, I decided that when the time came to make a new version, I wanted the heart centered and more prominent. And then a few months ago I realized that a scrappy version would fit perfectly as a Stash Artists pattern, so it made its way into the line of quilts to be made. Now it has finally been made!

In this version, the blocks are bigger, the heart is centered, and the quilt is a 72" square. I enjoyed going through my stash of pink fabrics to select the ones that would become part of the heart. 

I pieced together many pieces of my scraps of Warm and Natural for the batting, using fusible batting tape for the joins for the first time. While the batting tape was easier than zig zag stitching, it was also more expensive, so I'll probably stick with stitching the pieces together in the future.

As you've probably noticed in the pictures already, I quilted it with a loop and heart meander, which is the same motif I used for the first Cross-Stitch Heart quilt. I love having that extra layer of echo between the two quilts. I debated between a teal thread that almost matched the background or a pale pink that would stand out more (both were Aurifil 50 wt). I asked for votes on social media, where the results were as split as my own thoughts. I was going to play it safe with the teal, but at the last moment I switched to the pink. It stands out a bit and I love it!

The back is a solid bright pink, so the pale pink thread stands out on that side, too.

I went with a scrappy pink binding to finish it off.

Cross-Stitch Heart is the new Stash Artists pattern for July, so members can login to their account to access the pattern. If you love stash-friendly and scrappy patterns, too, get on the waitlist to be notified when the Stash Artists doors are open again.

That's my most recent finish, what is yours? Link it up below and be sure to visit some of the other links to celebrate their finishes, too.

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