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As 2022 draws to a close, I wanted to take the opportunity to reflect on the past exciting year and to acknowledge each step on our journey and thank so many of you who have made such a difference this year as Caterpillar Cross Stitch turned 7 years old! Keep reading to catch up on everything we did during 2022 and what you can expect from us as we enter 2023!
Firstly I want to say a huge thank you to all of you - the stitchers worldwide who are so supportive, fun and loyal. For helping us improve, for the ideas, feedback and constant friendship albeit over the internet! I love each and every day designing new products and creating content to help spread the joy of cross stitch and I really do feel like the luckiest person alive to be able to call this my job so thank you for allowing me to do that.
I want to say a massive thanks to our team here for working so hard, being so supportive and fun and super resilient, our suppliers and collaborators. Samm, Katherine, Hannah, Maria, Brianna and Tim who all worked tirelessly this past year to keep the wheels turning, help with customer service, create your cross stitch kits and get them shipped on time.
Thanks to our Facebook group admins, the amazing Carla, Charlie and Claire who help keep the group one of the most positive and drama-free online! Thanks also to Carla, Lizzie, Annie and Charlie for hosting Stitching Social events and all of our wonderful sample stitchers especially Mandi.
A huge change that happened this summer was my husband Tim joining the company. Like me 8 years ago, he took the leap and quit his 9-5 job to become Operations Director of Caterpillar Cross Stitch after 11 years at the same company. I couldn't be happier to have him on the team and he's been invaluable since and is doing an amazing job.
Thank you to those designers and brands with whom I've collaborated this year on quilt designs and subscription boxes! Claire from Made Just Sew, Emily Peacock, Emma Congdon, Little Dove Designs, Autumn Lane Stitchery, Tiny Modernist and Pigeon Coop.
This year saw the launch and hosting of three mystery stitch-a-long projects; How Does Your Garden Grow in January, Touch of Magic in May and Stitch into Christmas in August.
Pre-order also opened for the new January 2023 SAL, British Isles Adventure! Thousands of you now join us for our stitch-a-longs from over 16 countries globally!
In total, we've donated £8,894 to charities including the NHS Charities Together, Mind, WIRES, Friends of the Earth, Blue Marine Foundation and Cancer Research UK.
During 2022, we've hosted 39 virtual Stitching Social events (welcoming 395 stitchers from all over the world). We stitched Cedar Lodge, Seaspray Cottage and the Jingle Bell Toy Emporium. In February, June and November 2023 we are hosting more events starting with our Piece of Cake bakery design!
This year I also really enjoyed working with The Craft Store (Hochanda) featuring on their TV shopping channel. A highlight of the year was attending the Stitch in London event hosted by our YouTube presenter, Marie. It was amazing to meet so many of you and put faces to names!
In July 2022 we also hosted the first ever Cross Stitch Picnic in St Nicholas Park, Warwick on one of the hottest days of the year! We stitched the new design especially for the event, ate cake, stitched in the shade and made new friends.
At the start of 2022 we started working with the talented branding designer Emma Lord to create a fresh, modern look for Carlos the Caterpillar! We rebranded all of our packaging and worked hard to reduce plastic where possible.
Over 23,000 of you joined us over on Facebook with 16,000 in our group and over 40,000 on Instagram! This year we also reached 30,000 subscribers on our YouTube channel with over 130 video tutorials for you to enjoy. Thank you to everyone for engaging with us on these platforms and for our wonderful guest tutor Marie.
Over the last year, in addition to the stitch-a-long projects, I'm proud to have created many more needle minder designs, a new aida band bag, pastel and glitter bobbins, the 6 subscription boxes and to have added more free patterns to our eBook which now includes 8 designs.
This year we launched the first ever CCS Advent calendar which was so much fun to design and curate. We shipped them all over the world and have had some incredible feedback so far with one stitcher commenting "The Advent calendar has been amazing, I feel like I’ve had my moneys worth before the end. Today's gift was goals; something that’s completely unexpected and cute." There will be another calendar for 2023 so watch this space and please sign up here for updates.
This year also saw the publication of my first book, Jump Into Cross Stitch available here. Including 6 new and exclusive patterns ranging from space, music, cats to camping! It's the perfect beginner-friendly gift idea for someone who would love to start cross stitching.
I'm thrilled to announce that Love It Stitch It (our new cross stitch design platform and dedicated online marketplace) launched in May 2022 and we have been welcoming our first users and making continual improvements with the help of our web development team. You can upload and convert images/photos or create charts from scratch then shop or sell designs all in one place! Catch the full promo video here for more information.
I'm in the process of designing our first cross stitcher's planner and finalising plans for our 2023 membership program. We'll be hosting many more events and classes and preparing for the next 2023 Advent calendar to open for pre-order in the summer!
We'll be launching many new products, needle minders, kits and stitch-a-longs and growing the team as we go! We are expanding our reach and selling our products through new stockists globally and specifically across the USA. I'm also putting together a new beginner-friendly bundle with everything a new cross stitcher could dream of!
I'll be working hard on managing Love It Stitch It, creating video tutorials for to show you exactly how it works, creating content for our subscribers and making sure the marketplace runs smoothly.
We'll be producing many more YouTube videos including helpful tutorials, chatty flosstubes and weekly updates.
There will be 6 more subscription boxes starting with Box 11 'Tropical Friends' designed by me which ships 1st February 2023. The British Isles Adventure stitch-a-long will launch on 26th January 2023 followed by 2 more SALs later in the year.
Here's wishing you a very merry Christmas and happy, healthy new year.
