A lovely evening of rug making

Three lovely ladies came to the rag rug workshop and we had a really creative evening, surrounded by strips of fabric! After looking at the rugs that I had brought along as examples it didn’t take long for everyone to pick up their hooks and get making. The technique is fairly simple to pick up, so everyone was soon focused on creating a masterpiece. The ladies have kindly sent me some photos of their rugs in progress, take a peek below.

A cosy evening in Teatray, waiting for the ladies to arrive.

All the ingredients needed to make a lovely rug.

Emma's rug in progress

Wendy's rug in progress

A dinosaur, an elephant and a surprise!

Last week I received a commission for a dinosaur and an elephant for two lucky girls that live in the Isle of Man. The dinosaur was picked from a selection that I featured on my blog recently and the elephant was made from scratch, with the colours all chosen by the recipient. I took great pleasure in wrapping them both up carefully and packing them into a box to be posted. They are expecting their baby brother to arrive very soon so I knitted him a little hat with a stalk so that everyone has a present.

Pass It Along

A fellow stitchy blogger, So Stacy Sews has had a lovely idea. She has set up a hashtag on Twitter (#twitterpassalong) which links people together to swap crafty books, magazines and patterns which they no longer want. This gives you a chance to have a sort out and pass things along to someone and also for you to find something that you could make good use of. I’ve had a look through all my patterns and picked out a few to share. They are all new and uncut. If you would like any of them then pop onto Twitter and use the hashtag #twitterpassalong to find them.

Dinosaurs are go!

One of my lovely dinosaurs needs a new home! I have reached the gigantic total of 10,000 views and to say thank you I am giving away this dinosaur. He is made from black and white suiting fabric, has cream coloured button eyes and soft purple felt spikes.

To enter the giveaway you need to pop over to my Etsy shop, choose your favourite item and include a link of this favourite item in a comment on this post. If you fancy telling me why you like that particular item that would be great. I will pull a name out of the hat on the 1st of March so keep an eye out to see if you have won!

The Spring Tea Party!

How does a Sunday afternoon filled with creativity, sewing, and a delicious seasonal afternoon tea sound? If that sounds like your kind of thing then you will love the Spring Tea Party where you will get to enjoy a delicious seasonal afternoon tea, followed by a workshop in which you will learn a traditional method of handstitched patchwork. It will be taking place on Sunday the 11th of March, 1pm till 4pm at Like a Teatray in the Sky.

Lovely patchwork hexagons ready for a project.

You will get to rummage through a large selection of fabrics and pick some out to start making your piece of patchwork, which you can then take home to transform into anything you like, from a pincushion to a quilt. I will bring along examples of the sorts of things that you can make and you will get your own set of templates to take home.

The Tea Parties are about having a tasty lunch, meeting new people and learning a new skill in relaxed and creative surroundings. They are always such a fun afternoon and I hope to see you there! The tickets cost £25 each, if you would like to book a place please email me at contact@georginagiles.co.uk.

Tutorial : Blanket Stitch

This tutorial will teach you how to do blanket stitch, a very useful and lovely stitch. Although the finished stitch looks complicated, it really is simple to do. You can use this stitch around the edge of anything, knitted or sewn, but I particularly love to use it on felt.

Here are all the things that you need to get started. Felt, embroidery thread, scissors and a needle (embroidery needles are easier to use as they have a larger eye).

To begin you will need two pieces of felt and a length of embroidery thread. I use four strands to get a nice thick stitch. I am making a little envelope from red felt to show you this stitch. Hold your two pieces of felt together and attach your thread as you normally would when beginning to hand stitch, with a small knot. Then insert your needle into the felt vertically down from the raw edge that you want your stitch to lie along.

Then take hold of the embroidery thread at the end that is nearest to the felt. Pull this taught and take it underneath the needle, which is still in the felt and has not yet been pulled through. The thread should now be held on the right side of the needle. Have a look at the next four photos to see this action clearly.

Now that your embroidery thread is tucked under and around your needle you can complete the stitch by simply pulling the needle through the felt.

When you have pulled the needle all the way through the stitch will look like this.

Then all that is left to do is to gently tighten the stitch by pulling the thread up and slightly to the right so that it is ready to begin your next stitch.

To begin your next stitch just repeat this process again and before long you will have a beautifully blanket stitched piece of felt!

The trick to keeping it looking super neat is when you insert your needle on the first step to keep it evenly spaced from all of your other stitches. You can also stitch around corners and curved edges.

Thank you Mum for teaching me this stitch many years ago, one winter afternoon so that I could finish off my knitting project.

Hide & Seek – An Update

Hide & Seek was a great success, with creative people from all over the country leaving out handmade gifts to brighten up January. Thank you to everyone that took part, you all put so much time and love into your work and to give it away is very generous of you. Here are a few photos that I have been sent of the hiding by Emily Carlill and Matthew Cleveland.

A lovely stuffed heart with an embroidered message.

Matthew put his photograph back where it was taken.