About Us

The Black Cat Stitchery is a counted cross-stitch and counted canvas needlepoint store located in the far northeastern corner of Illinois, approximately 1/2-mile from the Wisconsin border and just west of beautiful Lake Michigan. The owners are Erica Heyl and Paula Harris, two dear friends whose love of stitching brought them together – from stitching retreats and a series of yarn shop-hopping trips to finally deciding to open a cross-stitching store together. It has been quite a journey. We learn more every day about fiber arts, about the details of running a successful retail store, and about each other. We love the challenge of our work and truly enjoy greeting our customers as they come to browse and get “fiber therapy.”

Some tips for using this site effectively
Where possible, we include the stitch count for patterns and also the fabric, fibers and embellishments that patterns call for (see the Materials List tab). We list the fibers the designer used in making their model where indicated. We are not likely to have all of the fabrics listed in our patterns but still provide the information so that you know what the designer had in mind. Remember that images of patterns rarely match the actual fabric and fibers when you see them in person. Also, please note that patterns sometimes have errors in their materials lists. We will note error corrections when we are aware of them, but can not be held responsible for designer errors on their patterns.

We provide direct links under each pattern for the treasures, beads and/or embellishment pack it needs. Those will appear below the pattern on the page specific to that pattern. If there are patterns in a series, those will also appear beneath a pattern that is part of the series. Fibers are impractical for us to link this way. The easiest way to shop for fibers is to open our website twice on two separate browser pages. Use one site to find patterns you like and want. Use the second site to navigate to the fibers that a pattern calls for to add them to your order (ie, keeping the first site open so you can see the list of what’s needed as you shop for fibers). Abbreviations we use for fibers on the Materials List tab are provided at the bottom of the Fibers page.