What is it about this little tiny stitch that I love so much?

1.  It is easy to compensate.  No thinking required.

2.  It allows all the pretty colors of the painted canvas to show through. Here it is on a big leaf on Zecca’s Why Fit In.  Four colors of Kreinik Fine (#8) Braid were used and it seamlessly fills the area, yet all of the colors painted show through.

3.  It allows the area to recede into the background so other areas can become the star of the show. Since this is a tiny stitch, over just one canvas intersection any other stitches and threads are certain to come forward in front of the T Stitch.

4.  It doesn’t have any direction.  This is super important to me.  I like neutral stitches.  Stitches that don’t draw your eye in one direction or the other.  When selecting stitches we want to guide the eye not run the risk that the stitch will direct the eye off the canvas.

So, now that I have told you why I love it, there are a few tricks to working it.  I stitch it as diagrammed above.  It is just like continental stitch but only covering every other canvas thread.

You will get long sweeping covering stitches on the back of your canvas.  This is good, it creates a subtle shadow when viewed from the front.

As long as you work the stitch as shown, and don’t change the stitch order you will always have nice coverage on the back.  If you change your stitch order you will have light and dark patches throughout your stitching that will show on the front of the canvas. YUK!

Don’t work an area in patches because you get bored.  Lord knows I have the attention span of a gnat but don’t give in!  Don’t decide to cover only part of an area and then go back and stitch another part of the area.  You will see the seams!  Again, YUK!

Now, here’s the magical part.  Look at your canvas.  Canvas is woven.  When you look at the weave either the vertical or the horizontal thread is on top.  When you make your very first stitch look at what canvas thread you are covering.  Is it vertical or horizontal?  Whatever you choose, all subsequent stitches will cover the same canvas thread.  It doesn’t matter what row you are on or what direction your stitches slant.  Ok, that’s nice, but trust me, this is a game changer.  If you pay attention to this and it’s late at night and you don’t know where your next stitch will go this gives you a marker so that you can find your place.  It also means that you can work those 4 colors in the giant leaf individually and yet if you paid attention to your first stitch each row and color will connect seamlessly.  Pretty cool!

More than you ever wanted to know about a tiny stitch but now you know.

xo