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Two festivals again this summer, because one is never enough! Firstly we are back to Carry on Crafting between July 11th and 12th. This is held at the South of England Showground, Ardingley.

And secondly, Woolly Hugs is headlining (in our hearts) at Camp Bestival between July 30th – August 2nd. Well we are ACTUALLY having a charity stall! 

Please come and find us at either event if you are attending! 

At Carry on Crafting we plan to run Hugathon type workshop sessions throughout the weekend, focusing on our Cwtch project,  getting folk to make 6 inch squares.  We will be providing yarn. There is no booking needed for this, it will be a drop in activity.  It worked brilliantly over the last two years.. Hopefully it will be busy and great fun again. We will again be accepting ££ donations and spreading the woolly word. As last year (and nearer the time) we will make a blanket to raffle. This was extremely popular and a great fundraiser.

At Camp Bestival we will be again spreading the woolly word and running drop in pompom making sessions for families for a ££ donation, selling Besties and raffling a blanket like last year!

How to help by making BESTIES! THANK YOU!

The theme of Camp Bestival 2026 is ‘At the Beach’ so anything in this theme would be perfect, but any other animals would be perfect too.

So we are looking for small handheld 3D pocket friends. Sewn, knitted, crocheted. Cute or quirky. These sold incredibly well in previous years, over £1000 just in Besties last year, and with your love and support they will again. Because of the age range particularly at Camp Bestival, no buttons, sequins etc, ie nothing which can be a choking risk. Safety eyes or embroidered eyes only.

Last posting for Camp Bestival is 1st July, to Teddington, please write BESTIES on the outside! THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Thank you so much for joining us.  All funds raised will go directly into our own Woolly Hug projects. Every penny raised will go to help others, we hope you will support us, either by crafting, buying or even maybe both! Thank you so so much. x

Crafting info…

We would love our crafters to make Spring/Easter craft items, and to keep postage costs to a minimum we ask that ideally anything made can be sent on to a buyer in a large envelope. We are open to larger items too obviously, that is just a guide. We will then sell these beauties through the sale.

Some suggestions for you, but we are very open to others too…

1. Spring and Easter decorations, bunting, cards, garlands, Easter egg themes etc
2. Anything sheep wise is always SUPER popular!
3. Small gifts – Little bags, purses, brooches, hair accessories, key rings, gift bags, tags, not too many of one design helps.
4. Clothing – PLEASE no winter hats or scarves, please think spring/summer. Any that arrive we will keep for the Christmas sale later this year. PLEASE include the yarn type or ball band so we can let folk know how to wash their new treasure. Socks are always very popular!
5. Woolly, fabric, card, embroidered, beaded, all crafty crafts welcome!!
6. Lovely lovely things!

NB – PLEASE INCLUDE NAMES OF PATTERN DESIGNERS WHERE APPROPRIATE SO WE CAN CREDIT THEM. THANK YOU!

Absolute last posting for crafts to be Saturday 28th February please, earlier is better for us if at all possible. Thank you!

Please message for the posting information if you need, but it will be Teddington.

The Event itself…

Our Spring/Easter 2026 Craft sale and Auction will take place ONLINE on a Facebook Event page and our own Auction site attached to this website as before, between Monday 9th March and Sunday 15th March.

We are keeping it all crossed that this Sale will be a huge success, with your love and support we have every confidence, huge heartfelt thanks.

THANK YOU!!!!

Another extraordinary year, another year filled to the brim with the most wonderful response from YOU our wonderful crew! We are truly uplifted by you all. The dedication and compassion you show is a true force for good.  It gives us strength, we hope you feel this too. Just astonishing.

The response and enthusiasm to all our projects has been as bright and bold as ever. The spirit, generosity, love and care, truly feels boundless. We never take any of this for granted.   We’ve been able to help so many. Crafters and donors what you do is incredibly special and precious, giving compassion, woolly warmth and comfort to others, especially in these difficult times. We are filled with awe!

So as the old year draws to an end, we love to pause and to reflect upon the Woolly year just gone and although we say this every time, it really has been extraordinary. What a woolly journey we are all on together. Please take a moment to think about what it is you do. Sometimes we get bogged down in pesky ends, posting deadlines, crafting details, we forget to see what it is we are all achieving here for our recipients, together. And it is really  precious and special. Thank you!

It was BEYOND WONDERFUL to meet so many of you at our 2025 Hugathons. 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 work towards creating squares for a given project, it was Chernobs26 at our most recent Christmas meet up in Oxford. Hugathons are always vibrant and joyful. (With somewhat bonkers games of Bingo) If you worry about not knowing anyone, just let us know in advance and we will link you up, you’ll be glad you came!

We had the most fabulous journey around the UK in 2025! We started with our first Hugathon on February 1st in Brum! Then travelled south to Southampton in March before launching north again in the Autumn to Edinburgh, then back to Oxford for Christmas.

We start our 2026 Hugathons off with a visit to York on January 31st. Link is here, at this moment there are 2 tickets left! All info is in the link… then we are to London (Covent Garden area) on Sat, 21 Mar 2026, onto The Belfast Hugathon – Sat 9th May 2026!
and back to Edinburgh on 19th September. Full details on the last three very soon! We are still working on our Christmas destination 2026 but are aiming for the Gloucester area!

The hugathon is where the WH virtual community crosses over into a face to face community, meeting others who you may have got to know online. It’s so lovely to be able to sit and work and natter together, comparing notes and making friends. It epitomises the spirit of WH, crafters working together to benefit others. Alison

Not one but two summer festivals this year Carry on Crafting was the first and we ran it very much as a drop in knit and natter, for folk to find out about our projects and make us a square for Snugs or Cwtches. It was 38 degrees and we had all the festive yarn out! We even had our Christmas tree so that Cwtch squares could be pegged on! It was lovely to see so many of you there, and thank you again to our wonderful helpers, Jen E, Ali, Os, Our Peg, Hilary and Paula! It was great fun, both on spreading the word and fund-raising front. Thank you for all the balls of wool for the lucky dip, it was so brilliantly successful. We will be repeating that next year, news soon.

And joyfully back to Camp Bestival last summer. We had really missed it in 2024, because of my family’s Olympic tickets! We had the most wonderful time sharing the woolly love, and making a millionty pompoms! The families loved the crafting, at one point we had over 75 crafting with us, and the little Besties raised nearly a thousand pounds on their own. At both events the raffle for the blanket was so successful, thank you to the crafters. We’ve already been invited back To CB! Watch this space. Thank you so much to lovely Paula P for coming on the Sunday, we really needed you!

So onto our projects….

As last year, we are still processing the Poland trip with the visiting Ukrainian children and their incredible teachers. We were still there (at time of writing) less than 3 weeks ago. Exhausting and emotional yes, but our main take away is inspiration, to do more, be more, so glad we could be there. Thank you to the CCLL for letting us tag onto their trip AGAIN and hand out these blankets ourselves. These children have very little, still with the threats from the legacy of Chernobyl, made worse by the Russian invasion of the area, with war looming all around and the impact that has on every part of daily life. But the wonderful CCLL bring these children out for a respite holiday full of games, activities, Christmas fun, warmth, light and love. Its is just wonderful to see as they relax into just being children.

These children are now back in Ukraine with the uncertainty, dangers and chaos, there have been a lot of drone attacks in their area since they got back, it’s beyond awful, with all the fears and anxiety. But they’re all taking love and woolly warmth from us. It doesn’t fix anything but it’s a tangible sign of love and care. So many hugs! 

And a huge thank you for all those power banks and torches, they will give the most enormous support to the children and their families, a genuinely precious Christmas gift. They were having at least 16 hours a day of no power before the recent strikes, it will be worse now, hours of daylight are very short and December temperature averages for this region are between 0 degrees down to -4 degrees.

Our blog is here, please do go have a read, but here are some photos from the trip. The most enormous thanks to everyone.

Heartbreaking to see them go, they take our hearts with them.

Thank you to everyone for cutting the fabric strips for our craft activity for these lovely Ukrainian children. We cut, and we cut and we cut. Cut a few more. And again. We need more! Back to cutting. But it was so worth it! The children were so utterly engrossed in this activity, they LOVED the fabrics, the patterns, the texture, the sparkle in some. And every child and teacher (we’d planned for enough) had a gorgeous time and made a beautiful fabric wreath. So a huge thank you!

Our Little Hug project continues apace. We send to the Royal Hospital for Children, Glasgow, which was our original destination. This is a 256-bed hospital specialising in paediatric healthcare for children and young people up to the age of 16. When we first started of course it was Yorkhill. Our other main destination is to Ward 2 at the Great North Children’s Hospital in Newcastle. It is a very special thing to be able to do for the whole family. Knit, crochet, fabric – all equally welcomed here. We are very grateful to staff in the hospitals who get them to families. It’s an extra job and we really appreciate it. We do send on request to individuals too and tiny knits with no holes go to the NICU at John Radcliffe in Oxford.

Just a sample, there have been hundreds and all glorious!

We are delighted to have sent big collections of single bed sized Little Hugs to the teen ICUs at Great Ormond Street thank you to our wonderful Catherine at GOSH, and to the teen and young person cancer ward and children’s cancer wards at the Royal Marsden this year.

The Teenage Cancer Trust Unit (TCTU) at The Royal Marsden’s hospital in Sutton is a purpose-built unit for teenagers and young adults aged 16 to 24 years.They are going to share across their (getting the names of the ‘wards’ right) the Oak Centre for Children and Young People which includes:

McElwain Ward (age 1-16)

Teenage Cancer Trust Unit (age 16-24)

Outpatient and Day Care Unit.

Thank you to lovely Lucy Jarvis for getting us linked up, and delivering in person. We can’t thank her enough for this personal touch. Means the world.

Just a beautiful sample of our teen hugs, either to GOSH or to the Marsden

Our first deliveries of Little Hugs are due to go in January to Newcastle and Glasgow. It’s such a privilege getting them ready to go and seeing them leave on their way to the children.

Our Angel Hug project for bereaved families continues strongly, helping families going through incredibly bleak times, with so many supported again this year. We are truly thankful. The plain white Angels go to Glasgow maternity and the pastel ones as shown underneath go to the Haven House Children’s Hospice in London. All truly made and sent with love.

Nine Years of Candy’s Hugs – feels like yesterday

It is always at this time of year we remember beautiful Candy (known as Zombie to some) and remember the conversation we had just before Christmas 2016, hatching a plan to use her wonderful donation to kickstart a new project.  Our aim then was to make comforting cosy blankets with love in every stitch for women going through treatment for breast and other cancers, at times forming part of palliative care. Some make separate squares, others whole blankets.We called them Candy’s Hugs. It has turned out to be an incredible legacy, a vibrant rioting legacy. Hundreds have gone to women and girls of all ages, three over this last Christmas period, all bringing cheer and giving love and woolly warmth.

Kinship Hugs too, have been a wonderful blessing. They are an extension of, and in addition to, our existing Little Hug project. We make bigger blankets for folk in need of comfort. So many have gone this year, truly always made and sent with so much love. Sometimes we head into our amazing group known as the Square Squad to make personalised Kinship Blankets, with specific requests for personalised squares. No request ever seems to faze folk! If you feel like you’d like to investigate the Square Squad, do find them on Facebook! This just a sample..

In September we made a special Mumsnet Woolly Hug for lovely Swashbuckled. Tragically her son Ted died in a terrible accident. A wonderful team came together to make this for her. The header image comes from this blanket. In it together was a phrase Ted used and its one Swash has adopted, and we have too. We are better together. So much love surrounding Swash, we were able to make two blankets, one for her daughter too. A real tribute to a life filled with love. Remembering Ted.

And the gerbil is Maud. Some may say she was a virtual cheerleader for the project, but she’s very real and much loved.

Our Peony project has seen another busy year. We make and send blankets to elderly care in Newcastle. It’s great for folk who like to make separate squares just as an ongoing project. All crafting info for blankets is here, alongside the information about sensory lap blankets etc. They really do love and appreciate the hard work, so a huge thank you – info is here….

I would like to thank you for the beautiful blankets that you have provided us with, our patients are thrilled with the blankets, they give the ward a very homely feel which offers a lot of comfort to our patients.

And we still love our Hearty Hearts, some go to the transplant team, others to individuals who just need a little gift of love. This continues into 2026. do check it out.

All hail the incredible Woolly Avengers otherwise known as the Construction Crew! What an astonishing bunch of folk.  At times our requests (Cwtches, Candy’s, Kinship, Peonies, Snugs, Refugee blankets, Chernobs) are relentless and often with short notice. For this and several other projects, we could not function without you. The sheer joyful enthusiasm our calls for help is met with makes us so thankful. What wonders you are. And the SPEED OF RESPONSE! Thank you! If you think this sounds like something you’d like to try, come and find us, all welcome.

We sent a VAST number of beautifully knitted hat and scarf gift sets for Care Leavers. These are part of the Christmas Dinners’ project started by the inspirational poet Lemn Sissay. The aim is to create a positive memory, and bring happiness and Christmas joy to this group of 18-25 year olds who can be terribly isolated and lonely, especially around Christmas time. 

This year our sets were sent on to Christmas Dinner events in Bristol, London W12, Manchester, Folkestone, Barnsley, Leeds, North Kent, Birmingham and Huddersfield. It’s great to be able to show the brilliant young people attending Christmas Dinner events that we care using needles, yarn and kindness. So THANK YOU! The project continues into 2026!

Our Christmas Cwtch project is now so well established and we know by the response how loved this is.  Anyone can join from making one single square to as many blankets as you like!

Our super festive Little Hugs go to very sick children stuck on Ward 2 at the Great North Children’s Hospital in Newcastle over Christmas. Sent with love in every stitch for the whole family. As always these are  absolutely stunning. Thank you so much everyone, we know these have been loved by families going through incredibly difficult times.Thank you too to lovely Marie Samuels on Ward 2 for all her efforts, she hands them out on Christmas Eve, like the Christmas angel she is!

Cwtches also go to The Royal Marsden teen and children, and are taken and delivered in person by lovely Lucy J. While she was there this year she met a lad in reception who was just starting treatment. Bless his heart. So she helped him choose his blanket there and then. He chose the beauty featured. So much love for him and his family.

Very very special indeed. The most enormous thanks to Lucy. Love to all the children, teens and families at the Marsden

Cwtches continue into 2026 and if possible we’d like to reach MORE children with these, so please do have a think if this could be one for you next year! Link is here…. THANK YOU!

Our Snug project continues as we send woolly love to Looked After Children across the UK. This year to the Fostering and Supported Lodging Service for BCP council (Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole) It is a wonderful project, making these children something permanent, that they can take with them wherever they are.

We received this email, just before Christmas…

We would like say a BIG Thank you for the beautiful blankets received from you at BCP fostering. They are so beautiful my 3 foster children love them . Thank You for them.

Means the world doesn’t it? Snugs will run again in 2026, same crafting info as this year, destination the Fostering and Supported Lodging Service for BCP council (Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole) again, they have many more children than we could have reached this year.. This is such a wonderful project, so grateful that we reach as many children as we do. And that is all down to our wonderful, generous crafters. Let’s crack on!

We shared the blankets with our children today. The children, foster carers and staff are in awe…. Thank you so much to everyone who knitted, crocheted, joined and donated. It really is incredible. I have some foster carers who are keen to be involved in future and I’ve suggested a fostering craft group!

Two more wonderful craft sales took place this year, we LOVE seeing how creative and talented folk are. We know about the wool, but then we find even more talents are abundant. Our Spring Sale raises funds for our own projects, then at Christmas we love to send a donation of the profits to a chosen charity. This Christmas it was wonderful to be able to send to two wonderful Care leaver charities, the Christmas Dinner project and the Rees Foundation https://www.reesfoundation.org. We have included just a few photos of craft from both, in total across the two sales we had 785 items! ASTONISHING!

Really all that is left to say is THANK YOU!

Thank you again for every moment of thought given to our projects, every piece of ours you have read, the likes, shares, every SINGLE stitch, ball of yarn, search for pattern or idea, every single penny spent, every choice from our Amazon wishlist, every penny donated or raised, every single moment, every BLOOMIN pesky end, every ounce of support, every resource, every Post office queue, everything!

Thank you too to all on our wonderful Woolly Pack Facebook page for being marvellous. Come and find us if you’re not already there, it is our friendly and welcoming virtual pub! An extension to our regular Woolly Hugs page. All welcome to join, it’s a Facebook group with  a positive chatty environment, sometimes wool chat, often not, offering support whilst avoiding doom & gloom. Contribute as much as you like. No selling, no spam, no abuse, only support and kindness permitted. It’s a fabulous place to be, all we hoped for and more! Thank you so much to our wonderful admins, Caroline, Ali, Lisa, Steph, Jo, Jen, Alexsis without whom it wouldn’t be possible.  The link is here hopefully…

2026 is on its way, here’s to a wool packed year of helping as many folk as we can, supporting and encouraging, raising each other up, we couldn’t be more inspired and humbled by the woolly crew. It’s the togetherness. All love for the new year, keep well, stay safe, we need you all! G&G xxx

Chernobyl Project 2025 UPDATE! WE NEED HELP!

We are very much looking forward to our visit again this Christmas time to Poland, to meet the Ukrainian children coming for a respite holiday. And we get to give out our blankets again. Lovely people, we need to ask for another thing, we used to make stockings for the Ukrainian children living in the Chernobyl zone, now we ask for much more fundamental things because of the way war has touched their lives. We are after torches and power banks. If you can see your way clear to ordering one of these for a child in DESPERATE need we’d absolutely love this. These will be driven over and we will get to see them as they go to the children (and staff to deliver more widely) when we go to Poland. Please can you help? Thank you so so much xxxxx

THESE MUST ARRIVE WITH THE CCLL BY THE END OF NOVEMBER. NO LATER!

ADDRESS TO SEND TO – Dennis Vystavkin , 6 Hartley Business Park, Selborne Road, Alton, Hampshire, GU34 3HD.

From Dennis

The is a random snapshot of power supply schedule for tomorrow in the area where the kids are coming from. White doesn’t guarantee the power will be either (It could be there) where Red is DON’T expect power on these slots) Your powerbanks and torches are serving an invaluable role ! Please thank everyone who donated them

On average, they have no power for 16 hours out of every 24 hrs and it won’t improve this winter.

WE CAN HELP!

Black Friday is our friend here! So please if you can. One torch is one more child not sitting in the dark THANK YOU!

Am uploading some links from Amazon, these have been suggested by Dennis at CCLL

UGREEN Nexode Power Bank with Built-in Cable 20000mAh 45W In & Out Fast Charging 3-Way Output Portable Charger Mobile Phone Battery Pack Compatible with Galaxy S25, iPhone Air/17/16, iPad, Laptop

Power Bank 27,000mAh, QC 4.0 USB C 22.5W Fast Charging PD 20W Portable Charger, Mobile Phone Battery Pack 3 Outputs & 2 Inputs High Capacity Compatible for Smartphones

Torch LED 2000 Lumen Super Bright,2500 mAh High Capacity Rechargeable Pocket Size Torch with Magnet and COB Work Light,Powerful Flashlight

Power Bank 50000mAh Portable Charger: 22.5 W Fast Charging External Battery – Powerbank with Flashlight and Large Capacity-White

LED Torch Rechargeable, Super Bright Adjustable Focus Flashlight, 3 Lighting Modes, Long Battery Life, Waterproof

SUBOOS Rechargeable Camping Lanterns – Solar & Battery Powered Camping Light Lamp, Magnetic Base, Hanging Hook for Tent, Camp Accessories Portable for Emergency, Power Cuts

Fast charging and long battery life are key priorities alongside quality of course. Items must be USB rechargeable

We need help please. We loved taking a craft activity to share with the children last Christmas and loved working with the children. They in turn had enormous fun making pompoms! So we have been thinking of another craft to take this year. Obviously this has to be super portable.

And this is what we have come up with! Christmas wreaths! This will be a super straightforward activity and will create something very beautiful for their families. Even better it will pack very easy for the journey home.

We need your help please! We shall need you cutting!

We need 6 inch long by 1 inch strips of fabric in the colours below. Patterned, plain, metallic. Straight cut please. If using a fat quarter, 5 inch is fine, but 6 inch is ideal if possible.

These can be cut fabric, but cut fabric ribbon will work well too. The 12 inch wire base will be their starting point and then the children tie the strips on and fill up the space. We do plan to take some pom pom makers and yarn if children want to add pompoms.

When preparing to post, please get your parcel as flat as possible so lay strips flat in a sandwich bag. This will help us get the max out of our available luggage space!

We have added the rings to our Amazon Wishlist if anyone would like to donate these. Also duct tape to tape off any sharp bits and scissors which will just be useful.

Last posting please November 29th. To Southsea please. Do message for the address.

Made in honour and as a tribute to Swash’s 24 year old son Ted who was tragically killed in an accident. We were able to make two as folk were so kind, so one of the blankets is for Ted’s sister. And the little 12 inch cushion goes to Swashy with the blanket. Have also included photos of Maud, a wonderful constant companion to the crafting process.