Cross Stitch & Crafting Community Server
Over the years I’ve somehow managed to establish a wonderful community over on Discord, and here I’d love to share some of the amazing things we’ve been up to! I opened it up in 2015 and we’re now going on 11 years of crafting chaos!
Why Discord?
Discord is a FREE communication platform. A persistent chat room where you can discuss all sorts of things with like minded folks. While originally created for the gaming community, it’s evolved to be so much more over the years.
You can chat from your desktop, web browser, or phone. And while most folks on our server stick to text and photos, you can even do video and voice chat through it!
Join us over on the Pixel Stitch Discord Server to get started!
Do I need to be a cross stitcher?
No! While our server started as a cross stitch community, we’ve now got folks who do all sorts of crafts and hobbies and would love to chat about them! Make sure to hop into #role-customization once you’re in and pick up the Other Crafts, Gaming, or Off Topic optional channels depending on what you’d like to chat about!
Even those of us who do cross stitch often have times where it gets put on pause due to a new hobby taking over, life distracting us, or just burnout. You don’t need to be actively crafting anything if you just want to hang out with us. And hey, maybe our projects will inspire you to start again!
2,000 people!? That sounds chaotic!
It definitely can be sometimes! But generally not everyone is active at once. Sometimes it’s busy, other times it can be pretty quiet. People come and go, live in different time zones, get distracted by life, or just forget we exist for a bit. That’s okay!
We appreciate lurkers just as much as our regulars! You can chat about life daily or just pop in to ask a question about your current project. Participate as little or as much as you want. It’s all up to you. You can also mute or hide any channels/topics you’re not interested in to make things a little less overwhelming!
And for the lurkers, don’t worry: there’s no annoying bot automatically welcoming you the moment you step foot in the server. Actual humans will greet you only when you feel comfortable enough to chat!
Why Should You Join the Community?
If you’d like to get to know the folks in our community and share your current and future projects, ask questions about your craft, and generally chat about life.
Community
A sense of community is super helpful in crafting, especially if you don’t know any crafters in your real life. Just being able to share your current WIP and have people be excited about it is so invaluable. Other times you just want to know that others are working through the same kinda thing you are. We’re a bunch of enablers as well, so if you just need encouragement to start something new, we’ve got you covered!
Up to you what you need from the Discord community, but here’s what folks on the server have to say.
I took this screenshot in dark mode, because that’s my preference. Apologies if you’re a light mode person!
But don’t worry, you can customize your view however you’d like.
Craft Help
Sometimes it’s nice to just be able to ask folks questions who’ve already tried something. Have an idea and not sure how to implement it? Someone might have tried something similar already and have suggestions! Trying a new finishing technique and need advice? Need help finding the perfect pattern or troubleshooting an issue on your current project? We’re here to help!
Design/Art Feedback
Dipping your toe into designing patterns? We’ve got a fair amount of artists in here happy to provide feedback, help you pick thread colors, and generally be encouraging as you work! Whether you’re designing just for yourself or to potentially sell.
Community Events!
Every once in a while we do some fun community events! This can take a lot of different forms. Sometimes that’s just hopping in a voice channel to play games together, or daily sharing of whatever Advent Calendars you picked up. Other times it’s a little more organized, like some of the examples below:
Stitch-A-Longs
We’ve got a whole forum for the various stitch-a-longs going on at any given time! Whether it’s an official SAL or you several folks just happened to want to stitch the same pattern, you can share your current progress and help motivate others.
Above is just a few SALs currently running at the time of writing this page 🙂
Cross Stitch / Digital Swaps
Swaps are where you get assigned to a person, stitch something small based on their interests, and mail it to them~! And you get a gift in the mail from another community member as well. They’re a lot of fun! Some folks include extras like materials or snacks. Others stick to just the project due to time/budget constraints. Either way, someone took time out of their day to make you something and that’s amazing!
Some folks just aren’t comfortable giving their address to people online. That’s valid too! So we do digital swap on occasion as well where we gift each other patterns via email instead! With patterns purchased only for the purposes of gifting, with the designer’s permission of course. Or sometimes even custom designs from the pattern designers on the server!
Above is an package I received as part of a swap!
SuperCraftual / Buffy the Craftpile Slayer
Sometimes we choose a long running TV series and commit to watching it over the course of many months, dedicating that time to crafting while we watch. Some dedicate a project to this time, others work on whatever they have on hand. We’ve somehow managed to make it through Supernatural and are currently working through Buffy and Angel if you’d like to join us!
Choose Your Floss Adventure
A yearly event in June (or any time you want to do it really) where some of us get together and learn a new craft using the same embroidery floss most of us already have on hand.
I’ve got a Notion website over at FlossAdventure.com listing over 30 crafts you could conceivably do with embroidery thread. And of course, sharing your trials and attempts encourages others to try too. Or to give you tips on how to improve if you prefer!
I’ve personally had a ton of fun learning new crafts this way, since many of them don’t require any new materials!
Cross Stitch Quests
For a while in 2020 and again in 2023 we ran a fun little Cross Stitch themed RPG of sorts where you would create a character and tackle fun story challenges along with the community. While the quest site is no longer up, you can see a bit of the last iteration of it on the Wayback Machine. There’s always the chance something silly like this will pop up again!
An example above of one of the more straightforward quests (click to enlarge).
Other quests involved organizing your stash, researching, or stitching in a new way!