Making Time: Backstitch through February

Somehow we are 10 days into February already. While January crawled, this month seems to be sprinting. Before I get into the current month of meditative stitching, I want to indulge in a moment of reflection for January. (And if you need a refresher on what my Making Time series is all about, you can catch up here!)

I’ll be honest, I did not manage to fit 30 minutes of straight stitch into every day of the month. There was a 9-day stretch where redesigning sarahkbenning.com became all consuming and I did not keep up with my #skbmakingtime project. But I am not here to beat myself up—though there were a few moments where I was very hard on myself for failing to stick to my commitment less than one month into the year.

The daily practice is not about generating obligation or guilt though. It is intended as a form of self-care: 30 minutes a day to slow down, reflect, and create freed from external and internal expectations. If life gets in the way and I don’t manage to get to it every day, that’s ok! Because the other truth is that some days in January I spent way longer than 30 minutes on my straight stitches. If I got into a groove, I let it play out, and it felt really good.

So here’s the scoop for February: Backstitch

This is another of the most basic of embroidery techniques. I honestly thought I might be a little bored by this one, but the segmented lines have become mesmerizing and I have found a lot of freedom and flexibility in the technique.

It wasn’t my original plan, but I decided to continue February’s stitching on the same piece that I started in January because there was so much empty space left on the stretched fabric. I am still stitching with DMC Pearl Cotton, but I changed up the color to create a very subtle visual separation between the months.

So that’s the idea. If you’re participating in your own daily practice of stitching, please share your work with #skbmakingtime!