Cross Stitch Samplers are one of my favorite pieces to work on. They make wonderful gifts for weddings and births. Below are pictured just a few of the many I have done as gifts or that hang on the walls of our home. The pictures in no way do justice to the finished pieces.
Some of the most beautiful and intricate sample patterns I have used were from the very early CrossStitch & Country Crafts magazine which I believe is no longer published.
The term sampler comes from the Latin exemplum meaning 'an example to be followed, a pattern, a model or example'. Samplers are different examples of stitches. It is generally believed that sampler stitching was carried out by young girls to encourage skills in stitching for use in later life. A sampler would probably have a variety of different stitches, and would be kept by the girl as a reference for future work. It would normally have been the particular individuals first attempt at stitching. If you are interested in the early history of samplers, a search on google will turn up many entries. Here are just a couple:
Since I have worked quite a few wedding samplers and birth samplers, I have given them their own page. The rest are listed here. Clicking on the link will take you to a page with info on that particular sampler.
