Dr. Mario Coasters

[HeavyTanHat]

I've just started stitching in the past few months, and learned about the mosaic stitch from this tutorial linked in another thread here. It occurred to me that A) the double size pixels from mosaic stitching would make the in-game viruses from Dr. Mario just the right size for a coaster and B) a set of Dr. Mario coaster would be a nice Christmas present for my mother, who used to love to play it and used to do counted cross stitch.

I finished the first of 6 today, after about 2 hours for the sprite yesterday and another half hour for the background today:



Its made on 7 count plastic canvas, which makes a nice sized 3.5" x 3.5" coaster.

I couldn't decide one just one pose per virus, so I'll be doing both poses for all 3:



HeavyTanHat
Eddie Lee

[Ellentje]

That looks great! I like the big pixels. I'm sure your mother will love them.
What kind of thread did you use? It looks thicker than normal DMC floss.

[Lijnloos]

Really cool, the way you did this! And same as Ellentje, what kind of thread are you using? Or is it wool or something?
Which reminds me, I can use my crochet-cotton on my (much too wide) plastic canvas as well...

[YeahYeahYouWere]

Very nice! I love the mosaic stitch - I plan to use it on my next set of coasters. That tutorial from ocw is superb.

Do you have any plans on how you're going to finish the back of the coaster?

[HeavyTanHat]

Thank you everyone for the kind words! I'm always sort of surprised when I get such a positive reaction to something Dr. Mario, as I don't remember it being that cool when it was new. Probably just not so cool among 9 year old boys...

It is indeed yarn, but 100% acrylic since it is meant to be a usable coaster. The yarn is all medium weight (#4) and most is Lion brand fun yarn since Jo-Ann had little skeins for $1 a few months ago when I got my first batch of supplies. The black is Red Heart super saver as I (correctly) guessed that I'd need more black than anything else and wanted a big skein.

Yet another advantage of mosaic stitch is it makes it easy to have a neat back, even when there are a lot of single stitches:



so I plan to just leave it as is.

I am *very* tempted to go get some floss or at least crochet cotton as there are so many more colors available, but I cannot justify the expense right now. Fortunately I like 8bit sprites, which play nicely with the colors available in yarn.

[Ellentje]

I'm surprised at how good the back looks, it really doesn't need any finishing. Might have to try this technique sometime.

[RenaeNaeMarie]

Wow it blows my mind how great the back looks. I'll definitely have to try this sometime. Great work!

[HeavyTanHat]

Wow, thanks for all the compliments on the back! Apparently the combination of nice big stitches to hide loose ends and a little OCD work for me. I got motivated to whip out another one tonight:



Around 4 hours total, although I think it took me as long to do the outside edge as the rest of the purple background. To those that stitch on plastic canvas, how do you do your edges? I like the coverage from doubling the yarn on the edge stitches, as both of these coasters have been, but I have to straighten the threads basically every stitch to keep them from twisting and giving the rippled appearance you can see in the above image at about the 1 o'clock position.

[YeahYeahYouWere]

They look great! It took me a second look to realize the back was actually the back it looked so organized!

Regarding the edges, I have always done what you did, with 2 stitches per hole in a running stitch all the way around. I run into the same problem where you have to align them constantly, but I don't know another way. Be sure to keep posting them as you get them done!