Tink Boord-Dill Alphabet Books

Like many needlepointers, I like to add initials, names and even sayings to my needlepoint. But looking for charted alphabets on-line is a pain. You can find them but, all too often, the alphabets will work for cross stitch and not for needlepoint. Once you find one, you have to count to see how big they are. For me, that’s hugely difficult.

That’s why my go-to books for alphabets are the ones by TinK Boord-Dill. There are two big books of alphabets, seven smaller books of alphabets, and two books that deal with the larger questions of monograms and lettering (read my review of the newer one here). The books are distributed by The Meredith Collection.

I love these books, especially the smaller ones, because they are immensely useful for stitchers, whether of needlepoint or cross stitch.

I have used them for many projects over the years, including the Celebrate Sampler (available here) and the letter Twinchies I made for my kids pictured throughout the article.

As you can see from the pictures, the variety of styles is huge.

The alphabet books all have the same format. Each alphabet has a name and a number (the size of the alphabet). Each alphabet chart has a number. In the table of contents this information is listed. Plus there is other helpful information here. Columns not if the alphabet works for needlepoint or cross stitch (almost all work for both). If an alphabet has more than one charT it’s noted after the alphabet number. Right after the name is information telling you what’s there: upper case, numbers, or lower case.

Many of the alphabets have all three types of characters, and some come in more than one size. The sizes range from 11 to 27, with the majority being 18 or 24. This makes them a really flexible sIZe for needlepoint.

There are also some specialized alphabets in the books including signal flags, email, braille, Morse code, and Hebrew. With so much variety, it’s easy to find letters that will make a wonderful project.

The first monogram book has even more alphabets, going up to 42 stitches high. These are all uppercase letters and can be combined in different ways to make custom monograms. Several of the alphabets in the book are already two or three letter monograms. Just pick the appropriate letter and location and you have an instant monogram. The second monogram book goes in depth on planning and creating monograms, names, and other forms of lettering.

These books are a great resource for stitchers and should be on your shelves.