J'aime Le Pâté Cross Stich Embroidery + Pattern

J'aime le pâté roughly translates as "I love pâté", "pâté" being a french starter or snack. It is spreadable meat (cooked pork or duck) that you can make sandwiches of easily. It is quite good but greasy, rustic and not very classy.

We were talking about a friend who always looks very cool and were wondering if he could still keep his cool when saying "J'aime le pâté". (he could).

So for his birthday I made a framed embroidery as neat and classy as possible about his new love for pâté.

It does raise some questions.

By the way, did you know I could not find a single pattern of a tin / can and had to make up my own.

Step 1: Tools and Materials

I have already done cross stitch tutorials in the past so I'm just going to repeat what I said about cross stitching.
Those of you who are familiar with cross stitching can go directly to step 3.

You will need aida cloth or other fabric fit for cross stitch. The size of the image in the end will depend on your type of cloth and how far apart the holes in it are.

You will need several colours of embroidery floss : black, light grey, dark grey, golden yellow, dark red.

An embroidery hoop and a small screwdriver will be very helpful but you may do it without hoop (if you use a hoop though, you will need a screwdriver). I prefer wooden ones to elastic plastic ones.

You will obviously need scissors and a needle (embroidery needles are usually bigger and less sharp than sewing needles, and their eye is bigger)

You may find all of the above in a fabric shop.

You will need a (very cheesy) frame. I usually advise to wait until the cross stitch is finish to take the measures.

Step 2: How to Cross Stitch

Cross stitch is made of little crosses side by side which make a big picture (a bit like pixel art).

The hoop is used to stretch the fabric and make it easier to stitch on it. Take the two circles apart. Put the smaller one on a table and place you fabric over it. Use the screwdriver on the bigger circle to widen it. Put the bigger circle on the smaller circle and trap the fabric between the two. Ajust the fabric before tightening the bigger circle.

Your embroidery floss is made of 6 threads. Cut a length of floss. Take two threads out of six and pull them through the eye of your needle. You don't make knots before cross stitching as you do when you sew.

Take a scrap of fabric and practice as follows before actually starting your project.

Pull your thread through a hole in the fabric, from under (the wrong side) to the top (the right side). Your needle must not catch the threads of the fabric. Pull the floss out, but not entirely, and leave a little length under the fabric. Try to visualize the little squares in the fabric. You are at the bottom left corner of one square, now put your needle across it in the top right corner and pull through (then again, not entirely). You should have made a diagonal half-cross.

Put the needle (now it should be under the fabric) through the hole that is just under your last one. As you do this, the floss will make a small loop under the fabric. Trap the loose end of your floss in it. On the right side of your fabric, you are now at the bottom right corner of your square. Put the needle across it into the top left hole. It should make a tiny cross.

When you have large areas to cross stitch, make all the half-crosses before going back and finishing them. It allows you to save floss and to make it look neat. All your crosses should be in the same direction (from bottom left to top right, and then from bottom right to top left, or the opposite, but stay coherent).

You can find several videos on Youtube on how to cross stitch if you think I am not clear enough.

To stop your thread and use another one, finish the half-cross you are doing, then go on the wrong side of the fabric. Stick your needle under a strand of floss, and then under the small loop you just created. Tighten and cut the floss.

For the text you will use backstitch. Is is exactly the same as plain stitches for sewing.

Step 3: Stitching Your Pattern

Here is the pattern that I made, you can print it or follow it from your screen. To keep track of what you are doing, I suggest you print it, start stitching and colour what you have done every 5 crosses or so with a pencil. Fold your fabric in 4 to find the centre of your fabric and start stitching fom the middle, it will prevent you from arriving to the edge and running out of fabric. The middle of the pattern is shown by the red lines.