The People Chose Freebies

Regular followers will be aware that for over 3 years now I have run a themed SAL on the first Saturday of each month.  First we spent 26 months doing The Alphabet Club and then 12 months of the Zodiac.  Now I have decided to listen to the People and post about your choice of theme.  Each month I ask for suggestions on the blog and then make a poll in the IHSW Facebook Group from those suggestions.

March - Freebies

April - Speciality Stitches

May - Flowers

Who doesn't love a freebie?  Especially when you are doing Stitch from Stash it's a great way to try a new designer, a new technique or just stitch a small.

Back in the olden days before t'internet freebies were sent to the needlework shops who gave them out to their customers, sometimes with the purchase of a specific item.  Just Nan did this a lot with her small designs.  You bought the charm and got a free chart.  As the internet grew in popularity designers realised they could have free designs on their websites which would bring customers direct to them.  The hope was that while you were there you would be tempted by a chart for sale.

So freebies serve a purpose - they are there to increase traffic and sales.  Which is why I loathe Pinterest so much.  It does neither.  It's rare that the link goes to the original designer.  When I am trying to find genuine freebies via Google, I used to get a page of links to websites and blogs, now I get a page of Pinterest.  Many of which are not even free charts.

So if you are sharing a freebie - please link to the original website or blog.  Don't show the chart.  Don't link to Pinterest.  Support our designers!

According to my records, my first freebie design was this one:

Lavender & Lace Christmas Angels found here

This was given to me by my local needlework shop back in 1998.  I then discovered that all the previous years were available online.  There are 20 altogether and I have stitched 12 of them, some as gifts for other people.

When I started blogging, I started storing freebie designs on my laptop along with the links which I keep on a separate page in this blog - Themed Freebie Links.  I do try to keep it up-to-date as links do vanish sometimes.  If you have any good links to add, please leave a comment.

One of my favourite blogs for freebies is the French designer Gazette 94.  I know very little about her except that she produces some wonderful freebies!  Here is the first one of her designs I stitched back in 2012:

Gazette 94 - Bonne Annee

Another favourite free series I collect is the Fairy Day Celebration series from Passione Ricamo.  Sadly, I have only stitched one and gave it away.

I really need to get these all stitched on various different hand-dyed fabrics.

A more recent trend is the freebie SAL which designers have realised is a great way to get people actually stitching the design - peer pressure at it's finest.  These are usually found on Facebook groups.  The designer releases a part of the SAL each week or month and everyone gets excited and joins in, encouraging more people to join the Closed Groups thus increasing the designer's following.

Great idea, everyone benefits.  If you keep up with the SAL.  

Otherwise you end up with something like this!  Started in 2014 and stalled because I didn't like the second block.

I did start the third block while querying the wisdom of stitching the skin over 1:

I will finish this one day.  I'm adding one older WIP to my rotation each year so this will have it's hour.  One day.

Now it's over to you. All you have to do is make a post on the theme of Freebies, mention The People's Choice SAL (you can copy the picture I used at the top of this post and in my side bar) and my blog. Please link up using the URL of the actual blog post, not the home page of your blog. I look forward to seeing what you all post.

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Finally, I need your suggestions for the next poll.  Any thing, no matter how obscure, weird or random will go into the poll.  Keep the theme suggestions to a single word or two - so you could have Cats, or Blue, or Holidays, or Warmth etc.  Really anything which could be illustrated in cross stitch.

Looking forward to reading them all!