Stitching Charcuterie Board

I just finished my first canvas of 2021...Charcuterie Board! I wanted to create this post to show what stitches I used and to show what colors go where. 

Feel free to get creative and don't feel like you have to follow these instructions; I'm all for stitchers personalizing their canvases to their liking! This is simply a guide to help you work through the canvas.

Charcuterie Board Items

Description of items (starting at almonds & going clockwise around the canvas):

• Almonds
• Green Olives
• Crackers
• Cheddar Cheese Cubes
• Blue Cheese
• Rosemary
• Fig
• Prosciutto
• Grapes
• Manchego Cheese
• Honey
• Rosemary
• Brie
• Gruyere Cheese

Recommended Thread & Placement:

• Light Brown: Essentials Fawn 625 (for border of brie, crackers, and border of manchego cheese)

• Off-White: Essentials Natural 503 (for brie and crackers)
• Yellowish/Orange: Essentials Bumble Bee 576 (for cheddar cheese cubes)
• Dark Brown: Pepper Pot Silk Chocolate 071 (for color of board)
• Dark Green: Essentials Ivy 731 (for dark green inside of the blue cheese) 
• Medium Green: Pepper Pot Silk Rosemary (for olives, rosemary, and stems of grapes)
• Medium Brown: Essentials Chipmunk 627 (for rind on gruyere cheese, almonds, and brown on the prosciutto)
• Light Grey: Essentials Signet 510 (for honey & olive container) 
• Red: Essentials Poppy 554 (for red in olives)
• Goldish Yellow: Essentials Lentil 593 (for honey, rind on blue cheese, and base of gruyere cheese) 
• Light Yellow: Essentials Twinkle 579 (for lightest yellow in the blue cheese, border of gruyere cheese, and the yellows in the manchego)
• Purple: Essentials June Bug 753 (for middle of the fig and deep purple in grapes)
• Light Green/Lime: Vineyard Silk C-234 Celery (for middle of the fig)
• Medium Pink: Pepper Pot Silk Melon 161 (for outside of the fig, darker pink in prosciutto, and lighter pink in the grapes)
• Light Pink: Essentials Crab 562 (for light pink in proscuitto)

You will also need a background color for around the board and the hole in the handle depending on how you’re finishing it, this can be your choice!

How I Stitched This:

While most of this canvas is completed in basketweave/tent, I did add a few little touches of different stitches and techniques.

• French Knots for the red in the green olives
• Long Stitches for the rosemary & the green on the grapes: I did these stitches randomly in varying directions
• Reverse Tent (not sure if this is the formal name): Reverse tent is just stitching the tent stitch in the other direction. For example, the tent stitch looks like this symbol: /  For reverse tent, you want your stitch to look like this symbol: \ 
• I used reverse tent in many places on the canvas: on the border of the crackers and on all of the cheese, on the lime green in the fig, on some of the olives to help differentiate the shapes, and on the borders of the containers for the honey and olives.
• Beading: I chose to bead the grapes and I'm really happy with how it turned out! I used the beads that I had in my stash so they're not the exact color, but I like it. For the lighter purple I used Mill Hill Frosted Glass Beads 62037 and for the darker purple I used the purples from Mill Hill Glass Seed Beads 00777. To be honest, I prefer using Sundance Beads and would recommend their size 14/15 for an 18 mesh canvas. 

I hope this inspired you a bit and helped you navigate this canvas! Again, feel free to get creative and switch up the colors or pick your own stitches. I love seeing how so many people can stitch the same canvas in such different ways!

If you have any other questions about this canvas or how I stitched it, please leave them below! We will be restocking this canvas in late Spring.