I want to share with you how I came to include Braille in many of my designs. My son is blind, and for a while I struggled with how to include him in what I do. Cross stitch is so visual, and when there is a block of solid stitching, the texture does not reflect the potential changes in colors. When I started thinking about how I could make my designs interesting to him, I immediately thought of adding Braille, since many of my designs include some text. However, I strongly dislike French knots (you will notice very few of my designs use them), and those are what came to mind for representing the Braille dots. Some wonderful designer friends suggested trying beads, which I did, and they worked wonderfully. In fact, I think they work better than French knots would have. It can be challenging at times, as I don’t want to just plop the Braille into the design anywhere – I want it to blend in, and “fit” with the design. It’s a challenge I love, though.

If you have any questions about why my son is blind, please feel free to email me at: olivehopedesign@mts.net I am willing to share about it, but I’m just not sure how much you want to hear about it.