Last week, we debuted Little Band Sampler, Susan Ache’s brand new collection of 10 delightfully sweet spools of floss. The collection is her second with Aurifil, following Little Quaker Christmas which released in Summer of 2018. There are so many reasons why we love Susan and her epic cross stitch, but the biggest one is her passion for the craft. We’ve had countless conversations with Susan during which she excitedly states that she just LOVES Aurifloss for cross-stitch and wants to share that love with everyone. If Susan had her way, all cross stitch would come from our little wooden spools and we can’t really argue with that;).
We’re thrilled to hand the blog over to her once more for the second part of her Little Band Sampler series. Thank you, Susan!! <3
Last time I was here, I talked to you about the history of the band sampler and how the color choices were just not available. Knowing that I had my choice of 270 colors to pick from, I wanted you to be able to play with a rainbow of your own for your own band sampler.
Now, the colors are bright, and some of the colors you may not like side by side. It’s okay, it’s your sampler and you can choose. You may want different combinations of colors and you may want to add more or less per row.
I have talked about stitch count and how to figure that out and I have also talked about going rebel with your color choices. A band sampler is the perfect practice stitching for making your own color choices. With any chart that I want to change colors, I actually lay out my fabric in a sunny spot so I can see it well to move colors around. You can do the same thing with the 10 colors in the box you have here. Since I started at the top, I am going to walk you through my way, but the same thing is going to work even if you want to start in the middle.
The first thing you need to do is figure out if you want one, two or three colors in each band. Lay your colors out on the fabric just as they will appear in the rows. There will be repeats and this is a great time to pull out your phone and snap some pictures so that you remember what color you wanted where. The biggest concern, and really the only concern you have, is to make sure you move your colors around evenly throughout the sampler until you are happy with the mix.
There are what I would call “calming colors” in this box of fun and those are the tan and the grey. They seem to work wonderfully for breaking up the brightness throughout the sampler. You may want to use those more or less depending on your color selections.
Do you feel confident now to try and mix up the colors and create your own version of this band sampler? Don’t worry, the colors have been charted for you if you aren’t ready for that next level of stitching rebellion. When you do feel the confidence to change all of the colors in a stitching project, the same concept still applies. Lay it all out, pick your starting point, start laying colors out, and move them around until you love them. Take quick snapshots and above all, love your color selections. If you don’t, it’s only floss… take it out and replace it.
I do hope that you will have fun with this band sampler and all of the possibilities that come with with it!
Make sure to grab the FREE Little Band Sampler chart right HERE.
GIVEAWAY
To enter-to-win the Little Band Sampler Collection, click HERE to head to the Rafflecopter entry page. You do not have to complete all the options to be entered but the more options you choose, the more entries you have! The Giveaway will run from now until 11:59pm on Wednesday, June 19. We’ll select one random winner to be notified via email. Good luck and happy stitching!
THREAD COLLECTION DETAILS
Little Band Sampler
100% Aurifil Cotton, 10 Small Spools, Aurifloss (18yds/spool)
Colors included:
2530 – 2335 – 1148 – 2865 – 2535
2225 – 5015 – 4182 – 2606 – 6738
SUSAN’s FREE PATTERNS
Click here for access to download all PDFs.
2018 STITCHING WITH SUSAN SERIES
ABOUT SUSAN
Instagram — Susan’s Book
A love of color makes it easy for Susan to grab inspiration from her native Florida surroundings. With no grand idea other than knowing she wanted embroidery and nine patches in her first quilt, a new world opened up to this mom of now five grown children. Being self taught with many hours of reading about the makings of a quilt and quilt blocks has made this an a lifelong passion. Susan is always searching for new and fun ways to show off as many colors as she can in a quilt. Most of her quilts are a creative impulse from trips to the garden center, a photograph, or browsing through paint chip selections. “I really never see just the quilt, I seem to see the quilt in the room that it belongs in”. Working in a quilt store for years helped Susan to pursue that passion of color and the fabric inspired life she enjoys while constantly striving to make her next favorite quilt.
Wondering how many strands of aurifloss Susan is using for the stitches in the Little Band Sampler? Chart doesn’t say. So excited to start this project! Am a giant fan of Aurifloss and love my spools!
Nancy, She usually uses 2 strands over 2 threads on a 30 count evenweave. (I’ve asked her in the past: just sharing! 🙂
Thanks for the pattern!! I’m currently working on Susan’s 4th of July pattern: hoping to get it done for the 4th!
Where did she talk about stitch count? I don’t see that in this 2-part series, and the links for the 2018 Stitching with Susan only go to graphics.