Cross-stitch Christmas Cover | Making Christmas Tutorial {Upcycling}

Saturday 23 November 2013

Welcome to the Making Christmas blog hop! I hope you have made much more progress with your Making Christmas list! Today I will show you some of my home decorations. I am going for a chocolate brown and tartan theme this year - no I did not make it easy on myself, but it means you become much more creative suddenly!

Which leads me on nicely to today's tutorial - a knitted jumper turned into a cross-stitched fancy Christmas cushion. 



1. Get yourself a cheap (second-hand?) knitted jumper - with quite distinct stitches (so you can easily count the stitches - it is in fact even easier to have a jumper with some interesting stitch for ease of reference - you will see later). 


2. Measure the cushion - and 'trace' (with masking tape) the cushion.



3. Cut out the top cushion cover and (if you want to make it easier and more even - but it is a really time consuming task) make a grid, much like a cross-stitching fabric. 



 4. Start cross-stitching



I used a thread of cotton yarn and 4 threads of Rowan Kidsilk Aura (what I had in my stash)




I drafted my pattern from a  picture I found on Pinterest - it is quite an easy pattern (also not too big so it can fit nicely in the middle of the cushion cover). I also had a Christmas tree pattern in mind but it was too long for this cushion cover. 










5. Get rid of the grid (be careful of not undoing all your beautiful cross-stitching work), and there you have it a handmade cross-stitched cushion cover - made from a jumper.



I also made a second one. It was so much easier with the knitting fabric as I had a reference all the way through (it took a third of the time to make it, even though it is much more cross-stitched). I tried in this one to make the most of the brown against the white, it works pretty well. You can easily draft the pattern from my pictures - let me know if you have problems. 




In case you wonder about the back, to continue to chic winter theme, I got some felt fabric from John Lewis and grosgrain ribbon - all matching. Just a tip for the sewing: sew felt side on top. I used the sew mama sew tutorial as per usual - it works great with ribbon too!



And here we are - styled with Latte (one of my knitted blankets).



So who is up for making one (or two, or more) this Christmas? For an even easier version you could buy a fair isle jumper and just make a cushion cover out of it (no cross stitching unless you want to emboss some of the pattern) - it will look great too! Let me know if you are making one, I would love to see your version!



Apart from that, I have nearly made nothing of my list - but there is still time... and evenings to knit, sew and crochet! So now is your turn, link up your updates on your list!



25 comments:

  1. That is gorgeous! I will now be hoarding all my old jumpers!!!

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  2. Got! Lovely to see the final piece after the sneak peek on IG :D

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  3. *gorgeous - sorry, distracted by baby!

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  4. Ooh! I need to make a few of that! Such a gorgeous idea Nat! Excuse me for I'm about to ask a very silly question... How do you turn it into a cushion cover without all the stitches unraveling? Just sew over, or...?

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    1. Hi Kessa,
      I keep the masking tape throughout the
      cross-stitching so it holds the stitches. As this is not handknitted (and the jumpers have probably been washed a few times) there is nothing else to do. I leave a couple of cms for seam allowance to be on the safeside.. But otherwise nothing special - except sewing with the felt on
      top..

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  5. They look great! What a wonderful idea.
    Love it, love it, love it!

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  6. These are fantastic, Nat. I love the combination of the jumpers and cross stitch and I like the way these cushions aren't too Christmassy so you can keep them after Christmas. This id certainly something I'd love to try although I don't know if I'll have time this year :)

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  7. what an absolutely great idea. I have a sweater that is now too big for me. It has singing and dancing penguins. This would make such a fun pillow cover. Thanks for the tutorial. I'm now off to find that sweater and start sewing today.

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  8. What a gorgeous pillow and a fantastic way to recycle a sweater! Nice work :)

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  9. That is such a fantastic idea!! I saw that pattern a lot when I was visiting Norway couple of months ago. Love the cushion.

    -Soma

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  10. Oh my gosh they are gorgeous!! I'm loving your choice of colour theme!

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  11. absolutely gorgeous! What a fabulous recycling idea. x

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  12. Dang, girl! That pillow cover is awesome!

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  13. These are super cute Nat - what a fantastic idea!

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  14. A chocolate brown and tartan theme for Christmas definitely sounds like a challenge - but you're so creative, I had no doubt from the beginning of the post that you rose to it and you certainly proved me right. These cushions are wonderful!
    xox,
    Cee

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