Designing cross-stitch patterns, I got frustrated with all the programs which expected me to click around a canvas setting individual pixels. I wanted a cross-stitch design software suite that I could drive with a Makefile, which could give me an interactive interface for stitching or compile them to PDF. In short, I wanted to say echo "shutdown -h now" | embellish --border | export pattern --pdf and get a design worthy of stitching on a pillow.

So, I made the thing I wanted. I'll discuss the many yak shaves along the way (proprietary file format reverse-engineering, OAuth2, what 'color' even means, unikernel hosting, and more). I'll talk a bit about the joy of making something so you can make something, and how it feels to craft software that is unapologetically personal.