Botanical Birds - PDF

Botanical Birds Cross Stitch Pattern (KDS #1931) by Kooler Design Studio

Botanical Birds is a charming counted cross stitch pattern designed by Linda Gillum for Kooler Design Studio, catalogued as KDS #1931 and part of the Kooler Classic Charts collection. This downloadable PDF pattern produces a beautifully detailed decorative piece featuring birds set among botanical elements, making it an ideal project for stitchers who appreciate nature-inspired needlework. The finished design is suitable as a framed decoration or display piece.

What Is Being Made

This pattern creates a single decorative embroidery piece showcasing botanical birds — a classic genre of needlework art that combines realistic or stylized bird imagery with lush plant life, flowers, and foliage. The completed piece has a stitch count of 134 stitches wide by 176 stitches high, making it a moderately sized project with excellent detail. At 14-count Aida, the finished stitched area measures approximately 9½ inches wide by 12½ inches tall, giving it a generous, portrait-style format well suited to framing.

Fabric and Materials

The pattern is designed to be stitched on 14-count White Aida cloth, one of the most widely used and beginner-friendly evenweave fabrics in counted cross stitch. Aida's clearly defined holes make it easy to place stitches accurately, which is particularly helpful when working with a design that includes fine detail and multiple colors. For those who prefer a finer or coarser finish, the pattern also provides size references for alternative fabric counts:

• 14-count Aida: approximately 9½ × 12½ inches
• 16-count Aida: approximately 8⅜ × 11 inches
• 18-count Aida: approximately 7⅜ × 9¾ inches

Stitchers are advised to add 4 to 6 inches to each measurement when cutting fabric to allow sufficient border for framing or finishing.

The thread called for is DMC embroidery floss, a universally available, colorfast, six-strand cotton thread. The palette used in this design is extensive and richly varied, encompassing a wide range of greens, blues, pinks, neutrals, and warm earth tones to render the botanical and bird imagery with depth and realism.

DMC Floss Colors Used

The full color palette includes the following DMC floss numbers:

• 166 — medium light moss green
• 211 — light lavender
• 225 — ultra light shell pink
• 310 — black
• 318 — light steel gray
• 341 — light blue violet
• 350 — medium coral
• 369 — very light pistachio green
• 400 — dark mahogany
• 413 — dark pewter gray
• 415 — pearl gray
• 472 — ultra light avocado green
• 518 — light wedgwood blue
• 676 — light old gold
• 680 — dark old gold
• 725 — topaz
• 729 — medium old gold
• 754 — light peach
• 762 — very light pearl gray
• 783 — medium topaz
• 931 — medium antique blue
• 932 — light antique blue
• 936 — very dark avocado green
• 3042 — light antique violet
• 3052 — medium green gray
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