I did a x-stich without a chart!

[RockstarGirl]

Well, sort of. This kitchen sampler is one that has been in my aunt's kitchen for YEARS, but she no longer had the pattern. So, I took my camera, turned on the macro focus, and took a few shots that were close-up enough that I could count the stitches, and this was the finished product:

Spoiler

(I just realized it wasn't *completely* done when I took that picture... the watermelon wasn't finished.)

Here's one of the photos of the original:

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My colors weren't identical and I'm sure some of my stitching wasn't exact, but it was pretty dang close.

[blackmageheart]

Hey, that's some good work! And eyesight!

I used to stitch everything without a chart...guess I'm getting lazy in my old age

[RockstarGirl]

The photos I took were high enough quality that counting stitches was easy, without having to strain my eyes (the one I uploaded was resized, the original is HUGE). I just sort of had to guesstimate floss colors, some of them were almost exact but some of them were a little off. All in all, I was pleased with it... but I still haven't managed to frame it.

[Kareesh]

Very nice! I would love something like that for my own kitchen.

[RockstarGirl]

Very nice! I would love something like that for my own kitchen.

I'd be happy to iron mine so it's good and flat, and take a couple of close up photos and send you, if you think you'd like to give it a shot like I did. The full-resolution photos are HUGE, and I take them with macro focus, so you can zoom in on each little section well enough to count stitches easily - or if I find the time (maybe once I finish the dragon I'm working on) I'll see if I can chart it up in KG stitch - I can't promise the colors will be right, cause I really have no idea what I used, best thing would probably just be try to eyeball it.

[Kareesh]

That would be great! They seem like pretty straight-forward colors, so I don't think it should be too hard.

[RockstarGirl]

I haven't forgotten you! I finally got a chance to wash this (and another project) and lay them out flat to get some good photos. I put them on photobucket, in this album: http://s55.photobucket.com/albums/g126/ ... enSampler/

There's three really close up photos and one of the entire design, for anyone who wants to tackle the project the way I did. Please ignore the cat hair you may find by zooming in on these photos... My cat decided to be helpful when I was laying it out to dry. Once I finish my pink dragon I'm in the middle of, I'm going to try to actually chart this up.

[RockstarGirl]

And here's the chart, I got time to sit down and knock one up in KG Stitch... ignore the color numbers, I just used stuff that looked kind of close to what I used. Pretty straightforward. Backstitching is done with 1 thread, except for borders and words, those are 2 threads.

KitchenSampler.sth

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