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i am going to be starting my xmas cards soon and bought some large piece of fabric. any tips on the best way to cut it to size the design size is 3 by 3 inches dont want to cut of too much or too little and what is the best way of mounting these in cards.note to self buy cards

Oh, no idea on the cards. I would suggest though that once you do know the right size to not waste fabric, draw it out on graph paper to make sure you get the most out of the fabric.

There is always going to be some wastage, of course. First, however, you have to decide what size aperture you are going to have on your cards. This will give you a basic size for the stitching space you need.

Don't forget to add space around all the edges of each of your designs if you are stitching on one large piece of cloth. The number of times people come a-cropper because they forget to add (say) an inch around all the sides is legion. So that means that between your designs, of course, you would want (say) 2 inches (an inch for each design).

First let me say that I dont' consider myself an expert!

I've used double sided tape to adhere cross stitch designs on cards.

As far as not wasting cloth, you can stitch several designs before cutting the fabric, just make sure you leave enough room in between them.

Also, if stitching a design on a small piece of cloth, before stitching, I sew a 3" strip of scrap cloth to each side. That way it fits into the hoop.

Lori

If you make sure there's enough room around each design, stitch them all on the large piece of fabric and only then cut them into card-sized squares. If you look in my SAL thread you'll see I did four kittens for coasters like that -- if I'd had to cut a separate piece for each I'd have wasted much more material.

it says 15 cm x 15cm so i would need 60x60 cm for 4? im thinking of finding sow slightly smaller as i dont like the cards suggested. would i need a smaller or bigger piece for 16ct aida i get a little confused

15cm for cards is huge! Usually i do my designs about 3 or 4cm by 4 or 5 cm, that way they fit into the standard aperture cards that you can buy. Stitching on 16 count will come out a bit smaller than on 14 count. I usually cut my fabric slightly bigger than the hole in the card, and then make sure i stitch the design in the middle of it.

sorry it says the size of fabric is 15 by 15 i still think there to big tho

It depends a bit on whether you like using a hoop -- if you do, you'll always have to cut the fabric relatively large. If you don't use a hoop, see how large the aperture in the crads you're going to use is, then allow half an inch or a bit over a centimeter on all sides. So suppose you want to do 6 designs, all of which will fit into a 7cm square aperture, then you would need about a 10cm square for each one of them, which you could either pre-cut, or you could stitch all six (measuring carefully!) on a 20x30cm piece. Hope that helps!