Gingerbread Needlebook

Gingerbread Needlebook — officially Gingerbread House Sewing Book — by Stacy Nash, taught as her class at The Jingle Ball 2024 (Saturday, December 7, 2024). The piece is a fold-open needlebook in the silhouette of a gingerbread house, with two stitched panels — the exterior face and the interior — sewn together into a small book with a wool pocket inside to hold your favorite stitching tools.

Exterior panel (front of the book): the house seen from outside. A scalloped icing roofline along the gable, a swag of pink-bow garland under the eaves, two yellow-paned upper windows, a second garland over the lower band, and at ground floor: a small Christmas tree on a red sled in the left window, peppermint-stick lampposts on either side of the front walk, and a deep red arched door with a green wreath hung dead-centre.

Interior panel (back of the book): the house cut open. Attic: a spool-stacked workspace with thread and yarn balls. Middle floor: a sewing scene — embroidery scissors, a strawberry-topped pincushion, a thimble, a button, all clustered around a small wooden sewing table. Ground floor: a green stone fireplace with three red stockings hung, a pink arched door, and heart ornaments dangling from a holly-and-berry garland above the mantel.

Stitched on 32ct Needle Bling Linen in Weeks Dye Works threads, 2 strands over 2.

The plan was to finish the cross-stitching before the December 7 live class so I could focus on the cutting, lining, and assembly during the class itself. I didn’t make it — got close, but not close enough, and once class came and went without a finished piece I lost momentum and put it down for almost a year. Picked it back up in November 2025 and finally finished.

Started November 20, 2024. Finished November 24, 2025.