It’s that time of year again! The new patterns for the 2026 HAED SAL have been released and sign ups are open through December 14, 2025. Don’t miss your chance to join me in stitching a new pattern this year! There is a Facebook group full of lovely people to stitch along with and if you meet the goals set by Heaven and Earth Designs you will receive free patterns at the end of the year. They also are giving out free patterns based on how many stitchers sign up for the SAL so sign up if you are interested!
For reference, I am just now barely finished with my first page of Innocent Dreams by L&L Designs for the 2025 SAL. I am stitching this on 25 count Evenweave 1×1 and it goes really fast when I am actually stitching it but I had to put it down for many many months this year due to our move and some life circumstances. I have been stitching on it most days for the past month and made significant progress. I usually can stitch about 300-500 stitches a day and Innocent Dreams is 85,264 stitches total so if my pace is 300 stitches a day it would take just over 284 days to complete which is totally doable. You would need to average 200 stitches a day to complete this piece in one year but HAED did release it early over the Christmas holiday so I feel like as long as you put in a longer day once a month it is feasible to finish Innocent Dreams within a year for even a slower stitcher. Keep in mind that even just finishing 6 of the 12 full pages is enough to win the prize of all the other pattern choices for 2025.
The patterns HAED chose for 2026 are all gorgeous! I am having a really hard time choosing which one to do so it will hopefully motivate me to work through my piece next year and finish it so I can receive all 12 patterns a the end of the year. Some of the pieces this year are cropped versions of larger kits and others are new never been seen before designs. The panda with wings is part of a larger piece that I absolutely love so I will try and do the larger piece. Same goes for the tower on the top right.
Once of the pieces I am seriously considering is Glistening Wings by L&L Designs. This pattern is by the same designer as Innocent Dreams which I was really happy with this year but it is a little bit more colorful and I think it would look great if I added in some sparkly stitches along with the called for threads. To be part of the contest you do need to use called for threads in the design by HAED but I will need to check if it will be ok to then also add in some sparkles to make the wings shine. I would double check though if you are doing a pattern to see if your substitutions are following the rules.
This design finishes to the above dimensions on 25 count with 87,020 stitches total. You would need to stitch an average of 240 stitches a day in 2026 to finish this piece by the end of December deadline. I looked at the floss usage chart and there is a lot of black in this piece which looks to be mostly in the outlines. It is beautiful and I do like the rendering so it will be a fun piece to stitch. It would be especially fun to stitch the flower on the bottom right after doing so much background with the leaves and sunshine on the rest of the edges.
The other piece I am strongly considering is Stone Cottage Keep also by L&L Designs. I love the flowers and have not done a landscape pattern yet so I would love to try one. In looking over the floss usage chart it also looks like this pattern does not have any black (310) in it which is fascinating to me as I have never seen a pattern without any black at all in it!
I was thinking that Stone Cottage Keep would finish a little bit smaller than Glistening Wings but it is actually slightly larger at 88,145 stitches. You would need to only complete one or two extra stitches a day at 241.5 stitches daily to complete it within one year so the extra stitches are not significant in terms of how much longer it will take to complete if you look at the daily rate. If you are nearing the end of December though and facing a time crunch that extra thousand or so stitches will make a difference in your completion success possibility for sure!
I will probably be on the fence for at least a couple of more weeks while I try and figure out which piece to stitch. Both are good choices and I love them. Hopefully next year I will finish mine and then receive all 12 pieces so theoretically it won’t matter because I will finish and receive all of them right? I will announce which piece I choose on my new YouTube channel Cozy Oscoey in another week or two so stay tuned!
Which piece is your favorite?
Please Note: HAED deadlines are firm and having a Facebook account is required. Please also read through all of the requirements as if you do not fill out surveys as required HAED will refund your chart purchase and you won’t be able to participate.
Links:
2026 Heaven and Earth Designs SAL
