News: The Recorder & Times

THE RECORDER AND TIMES
Wednesday, March 17, 1999

City and district

Building Business, one stitch at a time Lyn woman's creative cross-stitch designs are drawing attention

By DEANNA CLARK
Staff Writer

LYN -- Joanne Gatenby reaches up with a washable marker and deftly draws on her computer screen.
It's an unusual site, until you realize just what Gatenby is up to with those markers.
"My husband tries to tell me not to do it." the cross-stitch designer and owner of X's & Oh's Original Cross-Stich Designs says while relaxing at her home-based business here. But sometimes when she needs a nice curve in a pattern it's easier to draw it on the screen and then use the mouse along the marker guidelines. Afterward, she wipes the screen clean.
I just have to make sure I'm using non-permanent markers."
In business for about six years, Gatenby is now selling her patterns across the country and into the United States. Her work is being noticed by major magazines and other Canadian designers.
Gatenby used to create all of her images on graph paper. Now she uses the computer, and a marker or two, to create a host of intricate images. The markers come in handy when she wants to see if a new colour will improve the design.
It was Gatenby's husband, Bill, who challenged her to create her own designs when she complained there weren't enough exciting patterns around.
"He had to be right," she recalls now. "I came up with 40 right away."

Many feature horses, lions, and happy familiy scenes.
Today, she is a member of the Needlworks Designers of Canada, and Canadian Living magazine has asked Gatenby and the group to design millenium images for cross-stitchers. The package could be featured in the magazine.

Last Christmas Gatenby designed a cross-stitching package that was well received by her customers.
"And now, I'm becoming international with my newsletter," Gatenby says, adding she now has a subscriber in Australia. Bill regularly updates her busines web page, so many others check out her new patterns on the net.

It's a family business. The couple's daughters Adriane, 13, and Katie, 12, regularly help out. Putting together a cross-stitch package can be complicated. Directions must be clear and the stitching floss must be distributed carefully.

"I pride myself on my clear directions," Gatenby says.
No one wants to fool around sorting floss, so her kits even come with the floss already separated on a colour card.
Her design ideas come from real life. Her file is filled with photographs of animals and scenic views taken on family vacations. Often she combines several images into one design. Unlike painters, Gatenby talks in thread colours.
"When you look at a scene, you look at it in terms of thread colours, what colours you would use, and how you will graph them." she says.
Gatenby receives many design requests. Girl Guides, schools and other groups ask her to create beginner and intermediate cross-stitch patterns. One of her most endearing designs is called "Home is where the love is," a picture of a two-story home with a veranda. A rainbow of colours is cascading over the house and gradually the bands turn into heart shapes, which sprinkle over the roof.
"We try to be a little different," says Gatenby.
For more information on X's & Oh's call Gatenby at 613-498-0726. Her designs are sold at Crystal Treasures in the Brockville Shopping Centre.

Joanne Gatenby's Lazy Leopard cross-stitch has been featured on the cover of Stoney Creek Cross-Stitch magazine. Altogether the Lyn resident has created more than 50 designs. Crafters from across the country are buying them.