I bought this project thinking it would be really cool for once to do some needlepoint in an art style other than "realistic." With all of the pinks and purples, I thought it would make a nice gift for my aunt when it was done. I had never ordered from this brand before, though, so I was a bit surprised when"”instead of the multiple neatly organized and labled bunches of thread that I am used to getting from my usual brand"”all of the yarn was packaged in one large bundle of thread that was collectively knotted in the middle. This often made it difficult but not impossible to find the thread colors I needed. As I worked on it, I enjoyed watching the design come together, but I kept running out of yarn in the colors that I needed. Since the way the yarn had been packaged made it difficult to find the colors I needed as I used each one up. I would eventually get frustrated and move on to another part of the pattern that called for another color, figuring that I would find more of the other colors I needed as the entire knot of yarn got progressively smaller and smaller... only I never did find more of those colors. Yesterday I completed as much as I could of the design with the yarn that had been included in the package, but there are several large, unfinished gaps where I did not have any more yarn in the appropriate colors. You can see in the pictures (taken just an hour ago) that my greatest deficit was in the second-lightest blue color, followed by the second-darkest and second-lightest green colors and the bright pink color. The lightest green, the lilac, and the yellow were all short by about the same amount. I had to go to the craft store, attempt to match thread colors as closely as possible, and purchase more yarn. What's weird is that although I ran out of seven colors, I also had way too much of several other colors. The coral color was the one with by far the greatest surplus of 12 strands. I am usually thrilled to have extra bits of certain colors to use on miscellaneous projects, but it just seemed odd this time that so many colors were short while several others were provided in such excess. Maybe whoever packaged the yarn for this design accidentally mixed up the quantities for the coral and the bright pink? But that wouldn't explain the extreme shortage of the blue and green colors, so idk. I really don't like giving low ratings. If this was just an issue of being short one or two colors, I would give a higher rating on this, but with deficiencies this numerous, two stars is about as high as I can justify. Sorry, Tobin; I don't think I'll be buying from you again.

I love the design and the color chart is superior to others of a similar price. However, my canvas was misprinted at an angle so that the top two corners do not line up. It is irritating.

Nice project

This is my third Design Works needlepoint kit. Their pieces are just beautiful! Very easy instructions included, as well as a stitch "map" to assist in those spots where you are not 100% sure which color to use. I have run short of yarn doing 2 of the 3 pieces, so use carefully and sparingly. However, each time they have promptly responded to my request on their website and sent me exactly what I needed!