Friday Freebie: Pisac Weave

Happy Friday! This week no SAL post so instead I have something amazing planned for you! Waaaay back in the beginning of February I saw a post on Instagram by Presentlyin, a woman who currently lives in Peru and sells fabulous locally handmade items - sadly I'm not in a position to buy all the pretty stuff she sells so I stick to admiring them instead. Don't get me wrong - I'm not complaining about the price of the things as they are hand made with love and the ladies who make these things get a fair price for them so it's totally worth it! They are just more than I can afford at this time.

A post shared by Dana 🌎 Chicago girl in Peru (@presentlyin) on Feb 2, 2019 at 8:18am PST

When I saw this post I was so, so inspired and immediately asked Presentlyin if it was ok for me to reproduce this in cross stitch and share the pattern with everyone. Fortunately the answer was yes so here I am with it as this week's Friday freebie!

And this is what I came up with! I had so much fun stitching this! I didn't really want to put it down but as I had to keep up with the SAL pre-stitching I had to. The pattern uses six colours - three red and three yellow. I stitched it on 14ct red Aida, which was fun as the middle red is almost exactly the same colour as the Aida. I made a whopping eighteen tassels for this, I used seventeen of them. While I was putting this together I could see this as a tiny bag instead of as a ornament, especially if stitched on a lower count fabric.

The tassels were made using five shades of red and five shades of yellow craft thread each for the plain red and plain yellow tassels. I used two of the reds and two of the yellows to make the mixed tassels. I wrapped the threads around my tassel template five times each rather than the usual ten as I wanted them to be plumper but not too plump. If you use fewer colours you will need to wrap them around more times to get them nice and plump. I used an entire skein of craft thread for the threads to attach the tassels with and to wrap around the top of them. If you don't know how to make tassels you can find my tutorial here

The tassels hanging on the side were braided together after first braiding a short length of the thread (this is easier if you have help, otherwise a heavy weight is useful for holding the tassels while you braid). I then tied an overhand knot and tucked it between the twist of the cord I made.

You could make this in any colour combination - on Presentlyin's website there is also a blue version but you could use three shades each of any two contrasting colours.

Alternatively you could use a coloured fabric and just pick one darker and one lighter shade to match it and only stitch them, leaving the middle colour blank to show the fabric. If you look at the picture above you can see that there isn't really much difference between the middle red and the fabric - it's difficult to spot the edge of where I stopped stitching before taking the photo without taking a closer look.

But wait... there is more! This pattern is also amazing when seen on its side and screamed to become a bookmark! I didn't have time to stitch one but I have included the pattern here so you can if you like!

You can find the pattern here
You can find the bookmark pattern here

Please do go check out Presentlyin on her Instagram or site - I'm not a customer nor was I paid in any way to promote her or her site, I just love what she does and am thrilled she let me create a cross stitch pattern based on one of her products.

I'll see you Tuesday for the next part of the Blackwork SAL!