100 Stitches - Double Cross Stitch

Time for another 100 Stitches post.  You may have noticed that I haven't done one of these for quite a while. 
The reason for that is that I haven't been able to find the right fabric for the last six stitches on my list.  

All six stitches are in the Canvas Embroidery section of 100 Stitches.  The description for that section says that there are single thread canvases, double thread, fine and coarse. The type of canvas to use depends upon the design and the thickness of the embroidery thread.    The important point is that the thread must completely cover the spaces and thread of the canvas.
 
The stitch diagrams show three different styles: a single thread canvas - vertical and horizontal thread with a large space between them{it looks like graph paper} a double thread canvas with the vertical and horizontal threads woven together; and a single tightly woven canvas with no space between the vertical and horizontal threads. 

I didn't find any canvas that fit the above descriptions so I decided to try this cross stitch fabric.  It is an 11 count aida.  It has quite a few vertical and horizontal threads meshed together creating a small grid.   It is really stiff and inflexible -  I thought maybe it could work for the double canvas? 

For the single, I bought this grid     {I don't know what I was thinking - look at the size of the holes!!}
It is made of a flexible plastic but it is really thick and cannot be put into a hoop.  Plus the floss just slips and slides around and you cannot get any tension so...

I shopped around some more and recently found this needlepoint canvas. I thought it would be perfect for the single.  It is stiff but fairly flexible

It was a bit difficult, but I did manage to get it into my hoop:

But you can see that the holes are still too big.  The perle cotton floss I used didn't even begin to cover them.  I think this could work if I used a wool needlepoint yarn {I tried regular yarn but my yarn needle was too big to fit through the holes}.

So, even though it isn't perfect, I used the cross stitch fabric to learn my first stitch in this category.   

I didn't even use a hoop for this!  The first step is to come up through the fabric:

Pull all the way through and then go back into the fabric two rows to the left and two rows above where the floss first emerged. 

Pull all the way through:

Come back up through the fabric two rows down from where you first went into the fabric:

Pull all the way through, bring the needle to the right and go back into the fabric two rows above where the floss very first emerged:

and come out one row to the left and two rows below:

Pull all the way through:

Now go into the fabric two rows above where the floss just emerged and come out one row to the left and one row below:

Pull all the way through:

Go back into the fabric two rows to the right:

and come out of the fabric one row down and two to the left:

Pull all the way through and you are ready to start the next stitch:

I think this fabric worked out fairly well for this stitch.  I would love to hear any thoughts, suggestions or any experience you have had with canvas stitching!

This was stitch number 85 on the 100 Stitches list.