Running Stitch

 or backstitch?

I vary between the two depending on how clear the pattern is and how confident I am feeling about the count on a blackwork piece.

This is the scroll work done as running stitch in one direction and ready to go back the other way, looks like something cryptic or alien. 

And on the back of the chair.

I like watching the way it makes different patterns working in the running stitch, I like figuring out where to start so that the there and back will leave me in the right place to start the next section.

I think it is one of the reasons that I like blackwork.

I much prefer where I can to do it in the running stitch, it feels that it flows better for me that way. 

And yes the lines still look "bent" and I still anticipate that once finished pressed and blocked that will be resolved. The pattern recommends using a hoop but I rarely do for  cross stitch unless I am working on a very very large count and need the hoop to help keep the holes open.

Ok A little update, whilst looking in one of my blackwork books and pausing in my search for fill patterns to read the "history of" bit at the front it tells me that what I do , the running stitch there and back again, is double running stitch or Holbien stitch (after the Tudor painter who most famously painted Henry VIII) so there you go been doing a fancy named stitch for years without knowing it!