Cross Stitch

Beginner Embroidery

A decorative embroidery stitch made of two diagonal stitches crossed over each other, traditionally worked on an evenweave or aida fabric grid.

Working on a grid, such as aida cloth, or a charted pattern, bring the needle up at the bottom-left corner of one grid square.
Insert the needle down at the top-right corner of the same square, forming a diagonal stitch.
Bring the needle back up at the bottom-right corner of the square.
Insert the needle down at the top-left corner, crossing over the first stitch to complete an X.
For a row of cross stitches, work all the bottom-left-to-top-right diagonals across the row first, then come back working all the top-left-crossing diagonals — this keeps every X crossing the same direction.

Keeping the top stitch of every X crossing in the same direction across your whole piece is what gives finished cross stitch its clean, uniform look.
Working a full row of half-stitches, all the same diagonal, and then crossing back over them is faster than completing each X individually, once you're working several stitches in a row.
Aida cloth's visible grid of holes makes it the most beginner-friendly fabric to count stitches on; evenweave fabric requires counting threads instead, which takes more practice.