Giveaways galore!

We have loads of lovely prizes for you this Christmas.  First of all I'd just like to announce the winner of our recent blog giveaway - Valerie M.  Congratulations Valerie, you've won a £25 voucher for Bead Crafty, we have contacted you through your blog.

Ok onto the giveaways - first up we currently have a giveaway running with Traplet Publications where you can win an annual subscription to either Sewing World Magazine or Patchwork & Quilting.  This competition is open worldwide and ends on Wednesday (30th Nov).  Details of how to enter can be found here. 

Secondly we have a fabric giveaway with new online fabric store Ecotale.  That has just gone live today, ends next Saturday (3rd Dec) and details of how to enter can be found here. 

ADVENT GIVEAWAY

We have of course saved the best for last.... from the 1st to the 25th of December we have teamed up with Abakhan Fabrics to giveaway prizes every single day!  That's right, prizes for every single day, just pop over here each day to view what prize is on offer and how to enter, plus you can check the winner's list to see if you won any prizes the previous days.

Prizes include gift vouchers for the Abakhan site, loads of fabric, sewing supplies, ribbons, buttons, sewing patterns, craft books and more. 

Although that will be a hard act to follow we also have a rather impressive fabric giveaway for the new year with My Fabric House.   So keep an eye on The Sewing Directory over Christmas and New Year for an array of great prizes.

Visit us here: www.thesewingdirectory.co.uk

Giveaway with Bead Crafty

Customising with Beads

Image from www.stylebop.co.uk

With the Christmas party season rapidly approaching and budgets being low have you considered using beads to customise an item you already have in your wardrobe? You can easily bring a bit of sparkle to a LBD, or add colour to a plain top by adding beaded detail. You don’t have to limit it just to embellishing clothing either; you can also use beads on your shoes too. Click on the embedded links for relevant tutorials to help you customise your clothing with beads.

Giveaway

Popular bead website Bead Crafty have kindly offered us a £25 voucher to giveaway to one lucky blog reader so they can start customising their clothing in time for the party season. To enter please leave a comment below letting us know what item you would customise with beads, and how you would plan to do it. For me I would love to add a swirly silver beaded design down one side of a plain black top. Competition ends midday Friday 25th November.

 

Bead Crafty has a great selection of beads and offer same day dispatch and free delivery on all orders, regardless of size. We recently placed an order with them midweek and received the beads by the weekend, plus we found their customer service team to be very helpful. Our tester was amazed by the presentation, wrapped in tissue paper and tied with a ribbon, with a free pack of beads and pack of love hearts included!

To find out more please visit http://www.beadcrafty.com/

This is a sponsored post.

New office!

As some of you may know i've spent the last couple of months making endless cups of tea for builders (they need 1 every hour apparantly!) whilst they have converted my garage into an office and playroom (so I can work whilst my son plays).

It's been a hard couple months with countless delays, problems and ever escalating costs but finally it's all done!  I now have a proper office to work from, and will hopefully be better able to seperate work & home life, a big challenge for many of us who work from home.  I'm still fiddling around with the layout but i've put a few pics of the before and after below. 

Great brickwork from the previous builders

The roof consisted of rotton wood, inches of concrete and ivy holding it all together!

The shoddy workmanship was apparant throughout

 

Thankfully the new garage is watertight, all gaps have been filled and all walls supported, plus it's been well insulated and carpeted to keep it nice and warm in there.  In fact it's actually warmer than the house now!  I've barracaded myself into a corner with my office furniture (i've added a bit more furniture after the pics below) in an attempt to keep little fiddling fingers out of my stuff...

Pretending to work...

The boss! He's such a slavedriver!

Never too young to learn to sew...

The playroom side of the room

I will be spending the next week or so moving furniture, my work stuff and my son's toys out there but it is almost there!  The best thing of it all is I will finally have space to get my sewing machine out, and if I try to leave the laptop out there I might be able to squeeze in some hand sewing in front of the tv in the evening.  I really want to learn to embroider so will try to get started on that in the evenings soon.

Create your own sewing kit with Korbond

Our current competition gives 2 lucky winners the chance to win a sewing kit which they have created.  Korbond are suppliers of sewing and craft accessories are are asking people to choose 8 items from their range of products to make their own kit, with the supplies that they need.

This prize would make a great Christmas present for a fellow sewist, or a treat for yourself.

For full details of how to enter please visit: http://www.thesewingdirectory.co.uk/news/2011/11/02/create-your-own-sewing-kit-with-korbond/

Focus on....

Focus on... School of Frock

School of Frock, based in Greenwich London, offer fun creative sewing classes for all ages (from 6 upwards).  Run by haute couture trained fashion designer Cilene Jenkins there are a selection of classes available for both children and adults.

Cilene set up the School of Frock 3 years ago after getting a MA from St Martins in Fashion, Textiles and Couture design and working with Vivienne Westwood.  She decided to set the school up because she noticed that sewing skills were no longer being passed down through the generations as they used to be. 

For children they cover a set topic each term, for instance at the moment they are studying patchwork & freestyle quilting. They also offer children's workshops covering clothing and accessories.  For teenagers they can help GCSE and A-Level students boost their studies and for adults they encourage people to bring along a project they want &to do and guide them in doing it.

For session times, prices and other information please visit: http://www.schooloffrock.com/  

Christmas Creativity Winners

Christmas Creativity Competition

The winning entry

We had a great selection of entries into our Christmas Creativity Competition this year from stockings to advent calanders, reindeer to Christmas bunting.  There was one clear winner who was head and shoulders above the rest, her entry was 'The stand out project for me - easily the for design, originality and finish' said Ali Myer from David & Charles.   Deborah Shepherd from Janome said she found it 'Stylish with simple sewing skills required.'  The winning entry is pictured at the bottom of the page.

There was a clear 2nd prize winner who several points ahead of the others (and who's second entry also would have been in 4th place - but prizes are limited to one per person).  For the other prizes it was a very close call, there were several entries of such a great calibre it was a hard choice for the judges to make....but without further ado lets announce the winners:

1st prize - Winning the Janome MC5900QC (rrp. £799) and being published in the winter edition of Cloth

Kerry Green with her Scandinavian Christmas tree cushion.

2nd Prize - Winning a £100 voucher for Abakhan Fabrics

Helen Wright with her Fairy Light Stocking.

3rd Prize - winning a £50 voucher for RUCraft

Susan Trevor with her advent calender.

4th Prize - Winning an annual subscription to Cloth Magazine

Mary Emmens with her Christmas Bunting.

5th Prize - Winning an annual subscription to Cloth Magazine

Suzan Dury with her advent calender bunting.

6th Prize - Winning an annual subscription to Cloth Magazine
Chris Webb with his Christmas Reindeer.

A big congratulations to all of the winners, we will be in touch with you all later today.  The winning tutorial will be published later this week and many of the others will follow in the lead up to Christmas.  A huge thank you to everyone who took the time to enter.