So…funny story.

I had this week’s technique done  and photographed and ready to blog when I happened to read Krista’s blog on Saturday. In it she promised a little tutorial on how to make a stitched “love” tag.

What?!?!? That’s what I already had done!

So I told her we needed to communicate more. And we laughed about it. And we (with Meghan’s help) came up with an awesome plan.

We decided to do our posts on the same day and link up to each other! That’s right, two for one, my friends – a “Love” tag and a “Laugh” tag! You are all so lucky today you should go buy lottery tickets or something!

Oh, and give a me share when you win, I did suggest you buy them, after all. 😉

These were inspired by Amy Tan who has an amazing clothing line that’s all hand stitched, and she also has stitched tags she sells. Krista and I thought we could make our own!

So, here’s my tag. When you’re done admiring :), go here and leave Krista some “love” (haha!).

Pretty simple supplies for this one: a tag, a pencil (my fun old school ones!), a paper piercing tool or push pin, and a needle and thread. I think twine would be pretty cool – textural and rustic looking, and baker’s twine would give it a neat look as well. I used DMC embroidery floss since I used to do quite a bit of cross stitching and have a ton of colours!

I also used a Stampin’ Up! Mat Pack that allowed me to keep the lines of holes straight and evenly spaced. The Tim Holtz Design Ruler has the same thing built in, but neither are necessary – you could eyeball it easily.

First, draw your words with a pencil, or trace your shape. I punched a small heart from a sticky note, laid it on the tag, and traced around it to get my shape. Again, you could just eyeball it instead.

Next, punch your holes. Don’t put them too close together or you’ll tear the paper when you pull the floss through. That’s where the piercing template came in handy – holes that are evenly spaced but not too close together.

As you can see, I didn’t hit my pencil lines exactly, they were just a guide.

Once you have everything drawn out and the holes punched, erase your pencil lines – they don’t look so nice on your finished product!

I used two different types of stitches for this one – a backstitch and a satin stitch. For stitching words or outlines, a backstitch is the easiest and most common stitch. The satin stitch is for filling in open spaces, like the heart. Both are super simple to do, trust me!

Pick your thread, twine or floss and start stitching! For the backstitch, you sew backwards to the direction you’re sewing (click the link, it’s easier than it sounds!). Sew So, you go up one hole…

…then back down the previous hole.

With the satin stitch, you simply do one long stitch across your shape, then do another next to it until you fill in the space.

When you have all your stitching done, you should have a tag that looks like this:

This was the very first time I’ve ever attempted this, so you can see that it really is super easy.

Since I wanted mist on my tag I did that before I started stitching. I didn’t want to discolour on the light pink heart.

Now, just add the tag as is to a project, layout, or card, or embellish it further.

The other thing I did with my tag was to draw a light pink line around the heart to better define the shape.

Go have fun and try this one out! And don’t forget to leave me a link if you do try it –  I’d love to see what you come up with!

But first, don’t forget to check out Krista’s tutorial for her “love” tag – it’s *lovely*!

Also, Happy Birthday to my friend Heidi – I hope this is the beginning of your best year ever! Love you!

S.