Half-Cross, Half-Pint Garden

I really love stitchery gardens!
I simply can't resist buying patterns that have gardens in them. And I especially love aerial views of gardens. They're soooo precise and delicious. And knot gardens make me truly weak in the knees! One of my favorite stitchery garden designers is Liz Turner-Diehl. Every time I went to a Stitchery Festival, I ended up with one or two of her newest garden patterns. I think her colors and garden details are absolutely delightful....

So a few weeks ago, when I was in a real gardening mood, I decided to pull out her patterns and stitch up a small one (as a "break" in between stitching the larger and more complex pieces that I was designing).... I chose the "Emerald Garden" because it was so small, and I wanted to try a different technique other than cross-stitch.

Instead of using cross-stitches, I wanted to try using a HALF cross-stitch thruout...in other words, use a plain ole Tent Stitch (the basic needlepoint stitch). I chose a smaller weave fabric: an 18 ct. cream Davosa, but I only stitched over ONE thread of fabric. And instead of backstitching everything, I didn't do any backstitching around the items - only where absolutely necessary (the water pond, the iron gate.)

Here's a closer look at the little garden areas.
You can see on the bricks (that I stitched with a variegated thread, as well as all the greenery) how the half-crosses look. A little sketchy, but still acceptable as far as I'm concerned. And I was able to work all of the specialty stitches as well, adapting them to the over-one weave wasn't hard at all. (Although the tiny Spider Web trees at the top were a bit tricky, so I switched over to French Knot trees in the bottom section.) And it didn't take me that long to stitch - under a week, while watching HGTV (of course)...

I use this technique quite often when I want to do a cross-stitch pattern, but don't want to actually do all that cross-stitching. I call it my "Half-Cross, Tent Stitch Quick Stitch Method." Because only stitching half crosses cuts the stitching time in half....so I can finish them quickly and then go on to start another new project (truly my FAVORITE part of the process)....

You might give this technique a try when you want to stitch up something fast. It's not only fast, but it's fun as well....and as you know, the quicker you finish your project, the sooner you can start another one!