#InStrankinWeTrust (Free cross-stitch pattern)

Happy Saturday, friends!

I was doing online Zumba this morning in my home office, looking at a framed cross-stitch I have just behind my monitor, and thinking “Wow, it’s been forever since I cross-stitched anything.”

I knew I’d have some couch time today because we had two of our daughter’s online dance recitals to watch via Zoom (lots of Zoom happening today in this house!), so I was exercising and thinking of what I might stitch.

I have a barely-started piece that says “F*CK COVID,” but it’s on black canvas and I quickly abandoned it at the start of the pandemic because it was hard to see the squares. So I started thinking about what I might start, and if there was a new pandemic-y phrase I might like hanging up somewhere.

BOOM! “In Strankin we trust.”

An ode to Dr. Robert Strang, Nova Scotia’s chief medical officer of health, and the Honourable Iain Rankin, Premier of Nova Scotia.

Feeling very grateful to them both, these days, as my husband and I have both had our first vaccination for 2.5 weeks now (#TeamModerna) and are eagerly looking forward to our second doses.

Their guidance has gotten us all through the terrible third wave, and now I get to see my sister again (ourdoors for now, but still way better than not seeing her at all!) and the kids are back in school (yayyyyyyyyy!).

So after Zumba, I whipped up a simple little design in Paint (yes, the same program I used as a kid to doodle jpegs of figure skaters and screw around with the spray paint tool) and started stitching on some pale blue aida fabric from my stash.

Please feel free to download the pattern, print it out, and stitch it yourself for personal use, but not for sale. If anyone asks you to make them one, tell them you’ll do it in exchange for convincing five people to get vaccinated. (Joking, but not really.)

GET VACCINATED, EVERYONE!

Happy stitches, b*tches! Love you all! xo