Doin' it Old School Cross Stitch Design

After making 3 Subversive Cross Stitch patterns right from the book, I decided to make one up of a saying I read in someone's signature line in their email.
I started my design career before there was computers were widely available-just before-so learned how to do it old school with paper, pencil, and scissors. So I thought I would show you how I did it.


1. I used the graph paper and letters in the back of the book to plot out my first thought of how I wanted the letters to be.




2. Then I cut it up and redid the layout getting the centering better by folding each new section in half (how high-tech of me!)






3. I used a wash-a-way marking pen to sketch the border and get it's spacing right. I used a border and details from the book.




And this is what I did: