Cross Stitch Hearts for Valentine’s Day

Stitch up some Plastic Canvas Cross Stitch Hearts for Valentine’s Day!

Lots of people have Christmas traditions or Thanksgiving traditions, but who has a Valentine’s Day tradition? I do! It’s family friendly and something I absolutely love. My Valentine’s Day tradition is doing a Spread the Love yarn bomb. If you’re not familiar with a yarn bomb, it’s street art, but using knitting, crochet, or other fiber work rather than paint or chalk. For many years I’ve done knit hearts and crochet hearts, but this year I’m changing things up a but with these plastic canvas hearts! 

Growing up we had quite a few plastic canvas crafts around the house. They were very popular for awhile! We still have some holiday decorations that my grandmothers had made. One of the great things about working with plastic canvas is that it’s pretty easy to do, easier than other needlepoint type crafts. The canvas is larger, as are the needles, and I already had plenty of yarn to use.

Plastic Canvas Hearts

Supplies

• Plastic canvas
• Large needle
• Yarn
• Scissors

You have a couple options when it comes to getting the heart shape on your plastic canvas. They do sell plastic canvas shapes, and you can buy the pre-cut heart shape. I’m using just a standard sheet of plastic canvas and cut out my own hearts. I primarily cut out two sizes. The smaller heart is nine squares across and 8 squares tall. The larger heart is 17 rows across and 16 rows tall. It is important that the width of the heart be an odd number so that you can create the point at the bottom of the heart and have it centered.

For my hearts I used the Continental Stitch. This is essentially half a cross stitch. You can work left to right or right to left. I started at the bottom of the heart and worked side to side in rows from top to bottom. (I sort of made of the stitches for the X and O, just focused on getting them centered where I wanted them, and then filling in around them with the Continental Stitch.)

What is cross stitch?
Cross stitch is a form of embroidery and is one of the easiest forms of hand embroidery to learn. Cross stitch is gnerally comprised of X-shaped stitches done on fabric with an even and open weave. Plastic needlepoint canvas is a craft material of lightweight plastic with regularly spaced holes in imitation of embroidery canvas.

If you’re feeling nervous about needlepoint, I promise, plastic canvas it’s the easiest form of needlepoint I’ve ever done! This heart is the largest I cut, and was 25 squares across and 24 squares tall.

Play around with colors and patterns. I made some solid hearts, some striped hearts. and just had fun. Because they are for Valentine’s Day I did stick to three yarn colors, a red, a dark pink, and a light pink.

Cross Stitch Heart Yarn Bomb

With my fiber hearts finished, I’m ready to share the love!

Each heart gets a note attached to it saying share the love, you are loved, or even a simple Happy Valentine’s Day. Then the kids and I distribute them around town for people to randomly find.

We have some fun murals in our city with a heart or love theme, so I thought they would be a great place to leave a few hearts.

Doesn’t a mural that says Love need some cross stitch hearts left near it?

This is a tradition we love to share, so feel free to stitch up your own cross stitch hearts and share the love where you live!

Not quite up to leaving fiber hearts in public yet? That’s okay. A cross stitch heart is perfect to give to friends and loved ones. Use these plastic canvas hearts as a tag for a gift or as part of a handmade card. Everyone will appreciate the handmade touch you share with them this Valentine’s Day!