If you'd like to knit, sew or crochet for charity, come and join us at Woolly Hugs. All levels of experience and ability are welcome here.

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  • Come and be merry and bright. It’s the Malvern Christmas Hugathon! Saturday 28th November 2026

    Come and be merry and bright. It’s the Malvern Christmas Hugathon! Saturday 28th November 2026

    Tickets on sale from 7pm on Monday 1st September 2026. Set an alarm!

    The Great Woolly Hugs’ Christmas Hugathon in Malvern takes place on Saturday 28th November 2026 between 11.00am and 3.30pm, at Ascension Hall, The Church of The Ascension, Somers Park Ave, Malvern WR14 1XA. All welcome!

    Our Venue is fully accessible. Access to the venue is smooth from street level. There are accessible bathroom facilities.

    As it is our Christmas Hugathon you might like to wear any Christmas jumper/decorations you may have, but NO OBLIGATION!

    TICKETS COST £20 EACH, which includes Event swag!

    Our Hugathons are a wonderful opportunity to meet fellow Woolly Huggers who share a love of crafting. They are friendly and inclusive. It is a great time for chatting with your fellow Woolly crew and sharing ideas.

    We will also be running a couple of fundraisers, our fabulous Lucky Dip (£1 a go) and our legendary Gin Raffle (£1 a ticket)  We will also be running a DeStash table. If you have crafting items to donate to our DeStash table please do bring, remember one person’s destash is another person’s treasure! So do bring along some cash, or we do have a card machine if that is easier, happy to tap for any amount!

    And finally we will play a couple of games of our infamous Yarn Bingo game, but with a Christmas twist, you will not want to miss this!

    During the Hugathon we will attempt to get as many 6 inch squares made. Hopefully for Chernobyl 27 but this needs confirming. We will provide all SSDK, but please remember to bring your 4mm hooks/knitting needles, you will need them!

    We have access to hot water for drinks, and will provide the wherewithal for making tea and coffee for a donation. We are planning mulled wine and mince pies. Bring a packed lunch, snacks and drinks. Locally there is Le Delice, a proper French bakery, with a visit, it’s 2 mins away.

     

    How to get here..

    There is free street parking around the venue

    The nearest train station is Malvern Link with trains to London Paddington, Birmingham, Worcester etc. It is about a 20 min walk from the station.

    The address is…… The Church of The Ascension, Somers Park Avenue, Malvern, WR14 1XA

     

  • Come and be merry and bright. It’s the Malvern  Christmas Hugathon 2026!

    Come and be merry and bright. It’s the Malvern  Christmas Hugathon 2026!

    Come and be merry and bright. It’s the Malvern Christmas Hugathon!

    Tickets on sale from 7pm on Monday 1st September 2026. Set an alarm!

    The Great Woolly Hugs’ Christmas Hugathon in Malvern takes place on Saturday 28th November 2026 between 11.00am and 3.30pm, at Ascension Hall, The Church of The Ascension, Somers Park
    Ave, Malvern WR14 1XA. All welcome!

    Our Venue is fully accessible. Access to the venue is smooth from street level. There are accessible bathroom facilities.

    As it is our Christmas Hugathon you might like to wear any Christmas jumper/decorations you may have, but NO OBLIGATION! 

    TICKETS COST £20 EACH, which includes Event swag!

    Our Hugathons are a wonderful opportunity to meet fellow Woolly Huggers who share a love of crafting. They are friendly and inclusive. It is a great time for chatting with your fellow Woolly crew and sharing ideas.

    We will also be running a couple of fundraisers, our fabulous Lucky Dip (£1 a go) and our legendary Gin Raffle (£1 a ticket)  We will also be running a DeStash table. If you have crafting items to donate to our DeStash table please do bring, remember one person’s destash is another person’s treasure! So do bring along some cash, or we do have a card machine if that is easier, happy to tap for any amount!

    And finally we will play a couple of games of our infamous Yarn Bingo game, but with a Christmas twist, you will not want to miss this!

    During the Hugathon we will attempt to get as many 6 inch squares made. Hopefully for Chernobyl 27 but this needs confirming. We will provide all SSDK, but please remember to bring your 4mm hooks/knitting needles, you will need them!

    We have access to hot water for drinks, and will provide the wherewithal for making tea and coffee for a donation. We are planning mulled wine and mince pies. Bring a packed lunch, snacks and drinks. Locally there is Le Delice, a proper French bakery, with a visit, it’s 2 mins away.

    How to get here..

    There is free street parking around the venue

    The nearest train station is Malvern Link with trains to London Paddington, Birmingham, Worcester etc. It is about a 20 min walk from the station.

    The address is…… The Church of The Ascension, Somers Park Avenue, Malvern, WR14 1XA

    We look forward to seeing you there!

  • 2026. Our Christmas Craft Sale, the crafting phase!

    2026. Our Christmas Craft Sale, the crafting phase!

    Last posting for crafts please – October 19th. This is to Teddington. Earlier rather than later is much much easier on us though!

    THANK YOU!

    We know this feels super early, but we also know our lovely crafters like to plan and that crafting takes such a long time. We are delighted though to be launching our Christmas Craft Sale 2026, we hope you will join us. This is our biggest fundraiser of the year, and will help us raise much needed funds to continue our woolly work. With your love and support we hope it is a huge success! THANK YOU SO SO MUCH!

    The charity we shall support with a shared of funds raised this Christmas will be Air Ambulances UK (AAUK) This is the national charity that supports the lifesaving work of the UK’s air ambulance charities, helping them save even more lives every day. Read more about them here….

    So every penny we can raise will go to help others, we hope you will support us, either by crafting, buying or even maybe both! Thank you so so much.

    So let the Crafting Stage begin!

    Important update – we have become a victim of our own success with the craft sale, don’t get us wrong we are truly grateful for every item and need the fundraising, but with sensible heads on, and to make this a manageable endeavour, no more than 8 items per individual crafter, 12 total if sending from a crafting group.

    We are aiming to make and sell small/lightweight Christmas craft items. We are open to larger items too obviously, that is just a guide. Some suggestions for you, but we are very open to others too…

    • Stocking fillers, although obviously Father Christmas is REAL, this is just to help.
    • Christmas tree decorations.  Always very popular, as are totally bonkers quirky things, yes we are thinking gin wreaths, woolly slugs and sock pigs, who knew??!  
    • Stockings
    • Cute cuddly things / Besties
    • Small gifts – Little bags, purses, brooches, hair accessories, key rings, gift bags, tags,
    • Clothing items such as gloves, hats, scarves, – if making clothing PLEASE inc the ball band or let us know so we can pass this info on to those who buy. xxx
    • Bunting – everyone LOVES bunting. This could be sewn, knitted, crocheted etc.
    • Pocket friends, no bigger than palm size. Would suggest cute.
    • Book marks
    • Covered tape measures
    • Sewing type needle cases
    • Wreaths
    • Coasters
    • Cards
    • Lavender bags
    • Pencil/ hook cases
    • Hair accessories
    • Brooches
    • Keyring/bag tags
    • Pin cushions
    • face scrubbies
    • Covered notebooks
    • Animal headbands
    • Lovely lovely things!
    • Woolly, fabric, embroidered, beaded, ALL crafty crafts welcome!!

    The Event itself..

    November 7th – 15th The event itself will take place as usual all online through a Facebook event page and an Auction site attached to this website.

    Just a few items from previous sales to give you an idea!

  • Summer of Woolly Love 2026

    Summer of Woolly Love 2026

    We go on our summer break immediately after Camp Bestival on Sunday 2nd August (posting to us stops for the summer on July 1st) and we will be back on September 18th. It has been another busy year so far and we can’t thank everyone enough for all your hard work, compassion and enthusiasm.

    We know that many of you love a summer break project, some of you certainly need to be kept out of mischief and if you need yarn to take part, please do message us.

    This is such a beautiful project, we know in Newcastle staff go round on Christmas Eve with our Cwtches and tuck children in. Just lovely. It’s so tough to be so ill, with all the anxieties and emotions this brings, but this intensifies for the child and the whole family over the Christmas period. So it’s wonderful to do something which brings some joy.

    We are hoping to achieve our revised Christmas Cwtch project target of 50+. Size wise we are aiming to send a mix of sizes from smaller sized (Remember this project is included in Size Up September, minimum is now 32 inch) up to single bed sized.The majority will need to be at the bigger end. Last year we managed to send to our friends at Newcastle as usual plus the teen unit at the Marsden, we were 3 short of a complete set for the children’s ward at the Royal Marsden cancer hospital, obviously we sent other blankets so there were enough! If we had any over we’d send to elderly care at Newcastle, as they are often overlooked. Is this too much to aim for? We don’t think so. (aiming for the stars again!) We will though need to up our numbers of single bed sized blankets, and the easiest way to do this is to make squares! Obviously if you are up for a whole blanket that is truly excellent, thank you!

    All crafting info for this project is here…..

    For the woollies…….

    Six and twelve inch squares in Stylecraft Special DK, colours as listed

    • Claret
    • Cream
    • Grass Green
    • Kelly green
    • Green
    • Lipstick

    For the fabric folk…..

    Christmas cwtches could also be made in these sort of colours in cotton Christmassy prints, lightweight quilts. These must be machine washable and tumble dry possible only please.

    Thank you so much! October 5th, Last posting for squares AND whole blanket for Christmas Cwtches.

    Merry Summer Christmas folks! And thank you – you are ALL GOING ON THE NICE LIST!!!!

  • Size Up September! Launching in 2026

    Size Up September! Launching in 2026

    Following communication with our partner hospitals we are going to need to increase the size of our smallest blankets. This will affect Little Hugs, Cwtches, Angel Hugs (with the exception of those using the Sands pattern which is fine to continue to use) and we will include those for Haven House Hospice in this. This will help find every blanket a home moving forward. We have to make sure we are making what your recipients want to receive.

    If you have made at our smaller size for any of these projects, please still send. But from September our minimum accepted size will be 32 inches.

    We appreciate that this is a significant change, but as we say this is driven by the hospitals we support. If you will find this too much, maybe look to the projects which will accept squares, we are hoping not to lose any of our crafters!

    Thank you you so so much G&G

  • Fundraising at Camp Bestival 2026. Pom pom makers!

    Fundraising at Camp Bestival 2026. Pom pom makers!

    Step 1. Huge thanks for all the Besties coming in, the children adore these. We sold over £1000 last year. Just wow! Still time for more – the deadline is July 1st. Thank you!

    Step 2. How to help us by purchasing resources.

    The children loved making pompoms last year, parents donated to Woolly Hugs for these craft workshops, and it was a fabulous opportunity to chat about the work Woolly Hugs does. The number of crafters was pretty limited by the number of kits we had. So if anyone would like to buy us a set or two, thank you so so much, have a look here (at scissors and pompom makers) We also sold 60 kits of two little balls of yarn, we’d purchased, two pompom makers, then a pair of scissors for extra (where we had them). These kits were super popular and we could have sold more.

    If you do Amazon wish lists, we have one under Woolly Hugs, but we have also C&P some links below. Please send directly to Teddington, thank you so much.

    4 Sizes (small to large) of Pom Pom Maker Set for DIY Pompom

    Pompom Maker Kit 

    4 Pieces Of Embroidery Scissors, Metal Scissors, Multifunctional Hand Scissors

    Embroidery Scissors Stainless Small Craft Scissors 

  • The Great Woolly Hugs’ Hugathon, Edinburgh. Saturday 19th September 2026

    The Great Woolly Hugs’ Hugathon, Edinburgh. Saturday 19th September 2026

    The Great Woolly Hugs’ Hugathon in Edinburgh takes place on Saturday 19th September 2026 between 11.00am and 3.30pm, at St Columba’s by the Castle Church Hall in central Edinburgh, just off the Royal Mile, close to Edinburgh Castle. Our Venue is fully accessible. Access to the venue is via a gentle and wheelchair-friendly ramp from the street pavement and there is a lift to the level of the hall and garden area downstairs. There are accessible bathroom facilities.

    Tickets cost £20 each. On Sale from 7pm from June 1st 2026.

    Our Hugathons are a wonderful opportunity to meet fellow Woolly Huggers who share a love of crafting.They are very friendly and inclusive. It is a great time for chatting with your fellow Woolly crew and sharing ideas. If Tortie behaves we will let him come too! During the Hugathon we will attempt to get as many 6 inch squares made. In Edinburgh we are focussing on our Christmas Cwtch Project.   We will provide all SSDK, but please remember to bring your 4mm hooks/knitting needles, you will need them! If you have any squares already made for THIS project ONLY, please bring them, it may be that we can get some kits out for construction. We will also be running a rather fabulous Lucky Dip (£1 a go) and our legendary Gin Raffle (£1 a ticket)  We will also be running a DeStash table. If you have crafting items to donate to our DeStash table please do bring, remember one person’s destash is another person’s treasure! And finally we will play our Yarn Bingo game, you will not want to miss this! We have use of the kitchen area, and will provide the wherewithal for making tea and coffee for a donation. Bring a packed lunch, snacks and drinks, we won’t judge if that is alcohol! We will be flying to Edinburgh so will be unable to take any completed treasure home, apologies for this, we have very limited luggage allowance

     

    Do join us, we’d love to meet you or see you again. And if you are worried about not knowing anyone, let us know and we can get you seated and chatting as quick as a flash.

    The Christmas Cwtch palette (all SSDK yarn)

    • Claret
    • Cream
    • Grass green
    • Green
    • Kelly green
    • Lipstick

    How to get there…

    Lothian Region Transport buses run along nearby George IV Bridge and Lothian Road. The venue is also close to Princes Street and George Street, further bus information can be found at the City Council website. The venue is also reasonably close to Edinburgh’s Waverley station for rail services. There is a taxi rank at the station. Parking is limited in the area:Metered On-street parking: Johnston Terrace 8:30am – 6:30pm Mon-Sat (charges apply) Closest NCP Parking: Castle Terrace, Edinburgh EH1 2EW 

    St. Columba’s by the Castle, 14 Johnston Terrace, Edinburgh, EH1 2PW ( Big blue door!)