Autism Awareness Embroidery by Teri from I Play with Sticks and String

Hi! I’m Teri from over at I Play with Sticks and String, and I am NOT a cookier! Well, I am a cookier in that I EAT cookies…but I do not make cookies unless they come in a Pillsbury wrapper. Ha! I do, however, love to make things with sticks and string (aka knitting, crocheting, embroidery, quilting, etc).

*like this...

I also make embroidery patterns and some completed pieces that you can find in my Etsy shop!

I was introduced to Kim’s work through my friend Heather (she IS a cookier) who guest-posted here on the 12th. Kim was also introduced to my work the same way. And that’s when Kim practically begged me to do a guest post! (ok—not begged, but she did ask very nicely *grin*)

Kim told me she wanted to have all kinds of posts for Autism Awareness month--not just cookies. So I thought about it for all of about 5 minutes and said, Sure, why not?

About 5 minutes after that, I thought, OMG. WHAT am I going to do?? So I went through a few ideas and finally settled on an embroidery pattern. So I whipped one up and that was that! YEAH RIGHT!! I honestly had no idea what I would and/or could design. But beyond that, what in the world was I going to write??

Well, by trade (I guess you could say) I am a behavior health therapist. I work mainly with adults, and I see some couples and even fewer children. My experience with Autism Spectrum Disorders is completely limited to what I learned in graduate school, which, quite frankly, is not a whole lot! Thankfully, there are therapists out there that do know more than me, and they choose to work with kids with developmental disorders. Those are some special people—both the kids and the therapists!

Now I could go through some of the statistics about Autism, but seeing as how this is the 18^th of April and I’ve read the other posts before mine (thank you guest bloggers before me!), I know you’ve already seen all of those. So I’ve decided just to share the quote that is on the embroidery I did, because it sums it all up in a nutshell if you ask me.

Don’t underestimate persons with Autism,

try to understand.

--Joell @ Red Van Ramblings

Understanding—that is what kids with Autism need. That is what their families need. They don’t need judgment or ugly looks when their child “misbehaves” or doesn’t “act right.” They don’t need criticism for not being “good parents.” They don’t need insincere pats on the back or empty platitudes. They need understanding, compassion, and caring. Hopefully Kim’s month-long Autism Awareness guest blogs will inspire us all to be more understanding and compassionate.

Now, without further ado, here is my contribution to Autism Awareness Month. 

This is how it all began...just a pale blue pattern drawn on some linen-colored not-linen. *grin* Ya just gotta love blue washable-outable fabric pen!!

So now what to do? I have the general pattern, but I have no clue how to fill in the puzzle pieces. I finally decided on blue french knots and red seed stitch (which took FOR. EVER. by the way--never again!!)

Well that's all fine and good, but at this point I went completely blank as to how to fill in the other two pieces. Finally I came up with a fly stitch for the yellow piece...

...but that still left the green piece. What, oh what, to do??? Argh! I'd like to say I had some epiphany, but honestly, I just picked the easiest thing to do--a straight stitch.

HOWEVER--it wasn't so easy to keep the diagonal lines straight and even!! All in all, though, I'm happy with how it all turned out!

So here's the tah-dah--

**(sorry the picture looks hazy...I don't know what's up with that)

Tah-Dah!!  
Thanks for stopping by! Thanks to Kim for inviting me to be a part of this and share some of what I do! 
Be sure to check out all of Kim's April guests posts if you haven't already, and let's spread awareness about Autism!