Christmas Houses, Festive Embroidery Patterns

UPDATE: customisable versions of these patterns are now available in my Patreon pattern library, so you can add the current year or your own choice of text.

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I've been drawing more houses!

A pair of Christmas house embroidery patterns! There's a detailed pattern, which fits in a 7 inch embroidery hoop...

... and a simpler design which will be much quicker to stitch and fits in a 6 inch embroidery hoop. 

As you may have guessed, I've adapted these from my Stay Home embroidery pattern. I was filing that pattern away and looked at the little flowers/stars on the sides and thought "ooh, those could totally be SNOWFLAKES" and the new patterns evolved from there!

I'm really looking forward to sewing these patterns over the holidays. If you stitch one (or even both?!?) I hope curling up with some soothing stitching brings you some peace and solace during this difficult Christmas.

How To: Sew an Embroidered Felt Gingerbread House Ornament

A little house embroidery pattern + some ginger coloured felt = a sweet little gingerbread house to hang on your Christmas tree!

I shared a set of five free house embroidery patterns this spring, which I realised would be perfect for making little embroidered Christmas ornaments. They'd be sweet for any Christmas, but they feel particularly appropriate for this year of staying home!

To sew my ornament, I stretched a piece of ginger coloured felt in an embroidery hoop. I traced the house pattern onto a piece of white tissue paper with a ballpoint pen, adding 2020 to the roof and the house number 10 to the door to personalise the ornament (it's gonna be a gift for someone who doesn't read my blog!). I attached the tissue paper to the felt with large tacking stitches of sewing thread, then followed the lines to stitch the design.

I used white embroidery thread (floss) to represent lines of icing, using three of the six strands. I stitched most of the design in backstitch then added French knot berries to the little tree. 

I then removed the tacking stitches and carefully tore away the tissue paper, revealing the embroidered design. I carefully cut around the house leaving a border of felt around the edge. I then used the house shape to cut a second backing shape of felt, added a loop of narrow ribbon, and joined the layers together with blanket stitch. 

I lightly stuffed my ornament but flat houses also look great and would be ideal for popping inside a card to a friend this holiday season!

Click here to find the free little house embroidery patterns.

These patterns are for non commercial use only: you can use them to embroider as many houses as you want for yourself or as gifts, but please don't make any for sale. You may borrow a couple of photos if you want to blog about this project, but remember to credit me and link back to this page on my blog, and do not reproduce my entire  post or share my pattern on your site. Thanks!

Enjoyed these free patterns? Buy me a "coffee" and help support my blog!


P.S. Subscribe to my newsletter for a monthly free pattern and visit my crafty tutorial archive for lots more free projects.

Visit my shop to buy my printable PDF sewing patterns:

Christmas 2020 Felt Ornaments: Santa Wearing a Face Mask!

I couldn't resist sewing a special felt ornament to commemorate the deep weirdness of 2020!

 

I liked how this cute and silly felt masked Father Christmas bauble turned out so much that I've decided to sew a batch and pop them in my shops.

You'll find them in my main shop here and over in my Etsy shop here. 

My shops are set up with UK shipping only but if you live elsewhere and would like to buy one of these ornaments, please do get in touch! 

Please note: I've got very limited quantities of the royal blue felt I used to make these Santa ornaments and won't be able to get hold of any more before Christmas, so if you're interested in one of these please do order early to avoid disappointment.

UPDATE: Want to sew your own masked Santas? Click here for the tutorial!

How To: Sew Felt Pocket Hugs to Send to Your Friends

Today I'm sharing a cute and easy tutorial: how to sew a felt pocket hug!

Pocket hugs have started popping up all over the place recently: little tokens you can send to a loved one at the moment to send them a virtual hug while we're not allowed to give real ones.

They can tuck the hug in their pocket, carrying a reminder of your friendship and love wherever they go. It's such a lovely idea!

Obviously I couldn't resist sewing some felt hugs :)

These are quick and easy to sew and would be a great little project to work on in the evening while you're watching TV. You can stuff them like I did or keep them flat so you can pop them inside a card. They'd also be a great project for working on with kids, especially if you're teaching them to sew as part of homeschooling.

You will need:

- A heart template (I used the one from this tutorial, but you could make bigger hearts if you'd prefer)
- Tissue paper or an air erasable marker pen
- Craft and sewing scissors
- Felt
- Sewing thread to match the felt
- A contrasting shade of embroidery thread (floss) (I used white)
- A biro or other fine pen
- A sewing needle and pins
- Toy stuffing (don't have any toy stuffing? felt scraps would also work!)

How to make a felt hug:

1. Use your heart template to trace a heart shape onto tissue paper. Then write HUG in the centre in nice clear letters.

2. Roughly cut around the tissue paper heart and pin or hold the heart onto a piece of felt. Secure the heart with some large tacking stitches, using any shade of sewing thread and avoiding the lettering.

Don't have any tissue paper but do have an air-erasable marker pen? Use the pen to draw around the heart template directly onto the felt then write HUG in the centre. You could also use an ordinary felt tip for this but some of the pen marks will remain visible on the finished heart.

3. Embroider the lettering. I used three of the six strands from my embroidery thread (floss). You can sew white lettering like I did, or choose any colour that contrasts nicely with (and will stand out clearly from) the felt.

Sew the lettering with backstitch, following the pen lines and using smaller stitches as you sew around curves (this will help make the curves smoother and neater).

4. Remove the tacking stitches then cut out your heart, cutting through the tissue paper and felt at the same time.

If you've used a pen to draw your heart, just cut along the pen line. 

5. Carefully tear away the tissue paper then use your felt heart as a template to cut a second felt heart shape.

6. Place the two heart shapes together and sew around the edge with matching sewing thread. I used blanket stitch but whip stitch also works well.

Make sure you leave a gap big enough for your finger so you can stuff the heart in a moment.

7. Use toy stuffing to stuff the heart. Stuff it lightly, gradually adding small pieces of stuffing so you fill the shape evenly.

Don't have any toy stuffing? Use felt scraps instead! Cut them nice and small then add them to the heart in place of stuffing.

8. Finish your hug by sewing up the gap with more blanket or whip stitches and finishing your stitching neatly at the back.

And that's it: one happy little hug to send to a pal.

Click here for more lockdown craft ideas!

(The rainbow boxes would make fab gift boxes for sending your hugs. You could draw a smiling yellow sun in the bottom of the box when you colour it in then add your hug to the box, or use the sun template to make round hugs instead of heart-shaped ones).

This tutorial is for non commercial use only: you can use it to stitch as many hugs as you want for yourself or as gifts, but please don't make any for sale. You may borrow a couple of photos if you want to blog about this project, but remember to credit me and link back to this page on my blog, and do not reproduce my entire  post on your site. Thanks!

Enjoyed this free tutorial? Buy me a "coffee" and help support my blog!


P.S. Subscribe to my newsletter for a monthly free pattern and visit my crafty tutorial archive for lots more free projects.

Visit my shops to buy felt and colourful craft supplies, plus my printable PDF sewing patterns:

Lockdown Crafting: 12 tutorials for these troubled times

I got a really wonderful email last week from someone who'd been browsing my blog, stumbled on my box of sunshine tutorial and made a whole bunch of them as gifts for her friends and family. Such a lovely thing to do!

It feels particularly appropriate for this weird moment we're all in right now as rainbows have become such a powerful symbol of hope and care here in the UK. Sending a little rainbow box full of love to a friend or loved one you can't see in person seems to me to be a very powerful, wonderful thing.

Handmade gifts are wonderful things under ordinary circumstances, but at the moment they feel extra special. The power of a craft project to sooth and calm and distract and entertain also seems stronger and more important than ever while we're stuck at home amidst such stressful events.

So, here's a little round-up of projects from my blog that you guys might want to make right now. Click on the links or the photos to visit each tutorial. You'll also find lots more free crafty goodness in my tutorial archive and I share special freebies with my pattern newsletter subscribers, too.

Make a box of sunshine.

My box of sunshine tutorial includes templates and a step by step tutorial for making and assembling a rainbow box, and sewing a felt heart to go inside it. You could also use this box for gifting other things like a small brooch. This would be a great project to make with your kids, as there's lots of colouring involved and the sewing is very simple.

Sew a felt rainbow.

I shared this felt rainbow tutorial just a few weeks ago as part of a tutorial for making a weather-themed baby mobile, but I think the rainbows are a lovely project on their own. You could make these as brooches or ornaments, or sew them as they are and pop them inside a card to send to a friend.

Stay home and stitch a cute house.

I find embroidery so relaxing and really enjoyed stitching my recent Stay Home pattern. Stay home, sew stuff, save lives.

Or sew a felt house!

If embroidery's not your thing, why not sew a felt house instead? I think these would be a really sweet thing to send to a friend (from your house to theirs), or to commemorate our year of staying at home.

Embroider some self-care and positivity: be kind to yourself...

This is something I struggle with, especially when things get stressful! Stitch my Be Kind embroidery pattern for yourself, or send it to a friend who needs a reminder to look after themselves as well as other people.

 ... and remember that you're stronger than you know.

I bet you know someone who needs to hear this, too.

If you're spending a lot of time on Zoom lately, maybe you need some cute new brooches to accessorise with?

How about some plant lady brooches?

Or some fun cross stitch brooches?

You could also make a headband!

Bring spring to FaceTime with felt flowers...

... or go for more of a "I can't go to a party so I'm going to have one in my house" vibe.

Finally: sew a heart for someone you love.

There are lots of heart-themed projects in my tutorial archives for you to choose from but I think a heart brooch would be a particularly nice thing to make and send to a friend right now. They're small and easy to post, and your pal can pin them to their sweater or something in their house and think of you whenever they see it.

How about a mini cross stitch brooch?

Or a pretty layered heart, which I seem to have shared at a time when I was posting TINY photos on my blog. This sequinned heart would also make a cute brooch!

Enjoyed these free projects? Buy me a "coffee" and help support my blog!


P.S. Subscribe to my newsletter for a monthly(ish) free pattern and visit my crafty tutorial archive for lots more free projects.

Visit my shop to buy my printable PDF sewing patterns:

Stay Home, Save Lives: Free Embroidery Pattern

This week I'm sharing lots of little houses to stitch while you're stuck at home!

 

Maybe your community is currently in lockdown due to Covid-19, or maybe you're just staying home as much as possible to practise social distancing and help save lives. Either way I hope you'll enjoy stitching one of these projects to keep yourself entertained while normal life is on hold. I'm finding creative projects a great solace right now!

Today I'm sharing a sweet "Stay Home" pattern, then later in the week I'll be posting a set of five cute house patterns which you can frame in embroidery hoops, use to make embroidered ornaments, or stitch on anything else you fancy.

You'll find the "Stay Home" embroidery pattern at the bottom of this post.

I stitched my version in mainly pastel shades, on a bit of lovely grey linen-blend fabric. I used backstitch for most of the design, using all six strands in the skein to make the lines stand out really boldly, but you can of course use fewer strands if you prefer. Sewing with all six can be a little tricky!

I also used lazy daisy stitches for the leaves, and a French knot for the door handle. When sewing the flowers, work clockwise (or anticlockwise, either is fine!) sewing one single stitch per petal. I'd recommend sewing the flowers in front of the house before you sew their stems, so you can fill all of the vertical line that remains (after sewing the vertical petals) with green.

I stitched the design in a 7 inch embroidery hoop and framed it in a 6 inch hoop. Using the slightly larger hoop gives you a bit more room to work with.

The house embroidery patterns I'm sharing this week are all adapted from a tutorial I designed a few years ago for making cute little felt houses. Follow the link for the templates and step-by-step instructions! These patterns also make super cute gingerbread houses, perfect for Christmas.

This pattern is for non commercial use only: you can use it to stitch as many houses as you want for yourself or as gifts, but please don't make any for sale. You may borrow a couple of photos if you want to blog about this project, but remember to credit me and link back to this page on my blog, and do not reproduce my entire  post or share my pattern on your site. Thanks!

Enjoyed this free pattern? Buy me a "coffee" and help support my blog!


P.S. Subscribe to my newsletter for a monthly free pattern and visit my crafty tutorial archive for lots more free projects.

Visit my shop to buy my printable PDF sewing patterns:


Click here to open the pattern in a new window, make sure you're viewing it full size then print it at 100%.