Show your back (of projects)!

[purvislets]

Totally forgot to put the back of my current project!

[Serinde]

Very tidy!

[meerkat]

Definitely better than I could achieve

[LadyS]

I'm sure mine is the worst back on here, but since we're admitting our issues with neat backs here goes nothing.

First is me working on a towel, which means I at least attempted to be neat.



Now for the second bit, is what I was saying in another thread about how confetti works makes me lazy and then I think "screw it" and just jump all over the place and forget there's a project back.



Yes, I know, it's pretty terrible, someone said cat vomit, I say it just seems my threads exploded.

[rcperryls]

I think it is just an alternate design. Doesn't look bad to me at all. My confetti often looks far more jumbled up. Fortunately for me the worst ones are in frames. and so I can't take photos of them to show.

Carole

[Rose]

If you call that terrible then please never come to my house as you would have a heart attack with what mine looks like and NO I will not show my back. I find it is the back for a very good reason and no one has ever returned a gift because of the way my backs look.....

[LadyS]

You guys only say that 'cus the picture doesn't really show it up close. And I agree, when framing something, forget the back! And that is why I almost never do anything that won't be framed or have the back hidden somehow, hence why the towel I showed is incomplete, and been an UFO for years now.

I plan on frogging it and starting over with a simpler design, that design only gets more complex as it goes, as it was actually part of a sampler.

[toni99]

If I will show my back, everyone will have a heart attack

[Juel]

If I will show my back, everyone will have a heart attack

Showing my back would surely bring the dead back to life (so they can hit me for being untidy)

[xstitch1]

no way I am showing you my back, they are a bit messy

[xstitch1]

If you call that terrible then please never come to my house as you would have a heart attack with what mine looks like and NO I will not show my back. I find it is the back for a very good reason and no one has ever returned a gift because of the way my backs look.....

well said

[sarahm]

I dare not show the back of my last project, it looks horrendous! However it's not noticeable from the front and it's not lumpy so once it's framed no one will ever know the horrible secret it hides

[crazygalz87]

me too I also dare nt to show the back of my project. btw I realise that when i was doing my cross stitch, I can see some holes in my project. is it normal? I using 14 oct aida fabric with 2 strands..

[BizzieLizzie]

I realise that when i was doing my cross stitch, I can see some holes in my project. is it normal? I using 14 oct aida fabric with 2 strands..

If you mean the holes in the fabric are visible when it's stitched, you might be pulling your stitches too tight. Try doing them ever so slightly looser and see if it makes any difference.

Good luck!

[rcperryls]

It's been quite a while since I have done something in 14 ct, but it seems to me that 3 strands were what I used for that. I don't know that I have done anything larger than 14 ct. I usually stitch on 18 and sometimes 16 ct aida. And as BizzieLizzie says, you may be stitching too tightly also.

Carole


As an aside on backs: Years ago I saw at EPCOT (I think), but it might have been something I saw on television, the embroidery work of a Chinese woman whose backs made a completely different picture than from the front of her embroidery. I never figured out how she did it. It was truly unbelievable. I havne't cared that much about mine since then because I knew that someone somewhere will always do it better.

[Nachstenliebe]

After working with many higher counts (25-32) I can't seem to work 14 ct without using 3 strands.. that along with tension that was mention above might help you out...
Faith

[agi]

I have started to look for tutorials on how to make your back neat. Most of them just explain how to hide the ends of the thread which I have no problem with. Then I found this.

http://crafty-manx.deviantart.com/art/C ... l-88617016" target="_blank"

This is roughly what I have been doing, changing the direction of my stitches from vertical to horizontal all the time - I mean in the back, the front is always the same direction, of course. Also, I sometimes switch to doing a few stitches not in a row but crossing them as I go if that takes me to the next place to continue.
As I have learnt on this forum, and have been quite content with it, it is the front that counts.

However, I am going to teach stitching now. And I saw a piece of cross stitch done by a Swedish schoolgirl. All the back lines of the stitches were straight vertical lines. All! I can never do that, however hard I try. Even if I do pay attention to not turning the direction, I have some slanting lines at the ends of the rows or when the shapes are not square. HOW do you do that??? I know some of you can do it, please, explain.

On the other hand, she was carrying the thread across a long way and that was showing on the front. Now how was she taught then? Very neat in one sense and sloppy in the other? I didn't really get it.
A letter U, for example, looked something like this from the back:

llll--------llll (the horizontal line was the thread carried to the other side of the letter)
llll--------ll
llll--------ll
lllll-------lll
llllllllllllllllll


Please help me out with a tutorial or some advice! Thank you so much.

[carolanne]

Well, when I picked up this thread is was about backs. It seems to have shifted, which is ok, but my comment is about backs. I'm not sure how important I think neat backs are except for the bulk or show through factor. Mine, I don't have access to a camera these days, are so-so. Not too awful. But, the thing I kind of like about looking at them is they are sort of impressionistic. And I find I do like that in "art". So some that I've seen here are like that also. I also clicked on Maggie's link which went back to the earlier thread and yes, the kimono was unbelievable. I can't imagine how that was accomplished. Also, the thickness of the fabric you are working would have a big difference. I have mostly worked with 14ct, aida and similar and the thickness makes them forgiving. That's all for now.

[Ceitidh]

Tha backside of my Aurora Cabin is absolutely terrible!!! It looks like my picture was caught in a hurricane whilst stuck on a barbed wire fence.

[rcperryls]

That is the best description I have ever heard for what the backs of some of mine look like. Fortunately those are the ones in frames.

Carole