Today’s mini tutorial on stem stitch curls and spirals was prompted by some questions that have come in recently via email and in the comments on the various articles on stem stitch.

Some of the questions concerned me enough to reschedule today’s planned article. It seems some of you are really struggling with stem stitch on curls and spirals. On top of that, there’s some erroneous information out there about working curls or spirals with stem stitch.

A couple readers mentioned that they have attended classes in which the instructor taught that the working thread is always on the outside of a circle or curl, no matter what direction you’re stitching in, because that’s only way the circle will look smooth and the stitches will hold in place.

Wellllllll…this isn’t exactly true. I thought we better clear that point up, just in case others suffer under the same impression.

So, in this tutorials, I hope to answer questions on working curls in stem stitch without the stitches looking spiky, and I hope to clarify the relationship between the needle and the working thread when working into a curl.