This is one of those projects that right after I finished it I thought, that was kind of a lot of work and doesn't look that great. After taking a step back from it, I actually kind of love it.
It all started with these little letters that I found at an antique store. I looked for "WELCOME" or "HELLO" but unique letters were hard to find, so I ended up with "HI". (*The pic below also shows my other finds from that day! **Check back to read about Upcycled Owls)
Then at Goodwill I found the perfect frame, one with about an inch box behind it. (And it definitely needed a face lift!)
I pried it apart and then started cutting up skewers with a utility knife to fit inside the frame. I inserted two tight fitting skewers vertically, then used that as a "frame" to hot glue horizontal skewers at evenly spaced intervals.
Once the skewers were all in place, I cut a piece of white felt the width of the frame and about twice the height of the frame.
I inserted it between the frame box and the bottom skewer and hot glued the edge and then pressed it down in between the skewers. I used a knife, but later thought a credit card would have worked well.
I found this graphic online and printed it and cut it out and then taped it to my felt and cut around it.
Since Henry knows ALL the facts about octopuses, I know he'd appreciate having real "suckers"! I found these in the craft section at Walmart.
I hand sewed each of the suckers on.
I freehand cut seaweed from two different colors of green felt and then just sewed up the middle of each piece. I love the illusion of movement that gives them.
When Henry plays with his toy octopuses, it's usually in conjunction with a pirate ship and the octopus wraps its tentacles around the pirate ship. I planned to put this octopus page opposite a pirate ship page I'm working on and I really wanted to come up with a way the tentacles could stretch to attack the pirate ship. I was in Walmart automotive and saw a retractable badge holder and wondered if I could make that work.
Once I had the badge holder sewed underneath the octopus body, I hand sewed around the octopus.
I didn't sew around the legs, leaving some movement to them.
It's VERY fun to pull the tentacles - I can't want for Henry to see it!
This gives you a better view of the badge holder.
I used stick-on googly eyes.
I LOVE how it turned out!
Making a Quiet Book - here's what you need to get started:
One of the topics my nephew Henry (4 years old) is interested in is weather - specifically tornadoes, so I wanted to include a weather page in the Quiet Book I am making for him.
I included sunny, partly sunny, cloudy, stormy (lightning), rain, snow, tornado and rainbow. I used a template for the lightning bolt, but I think everything else I freehand cut.
I'm not going to lie to you - this page is tough to make. 1. Because of the intricate, small details. 2. Because geometry.
For this project you'll need:
1 sheet white felt
1 sheet light blue felt
scraps of felt in yellow, gray and rainbow colors
1 sheet stiffened felt
small amount of clear vinyl
1 brad
a hole punch (I borrowed my mom's Cropodile - which worked pretty well, although it was a little hard to get a punch in the center, so maybe a long reach punch would be helpful as well)
scissors
sewing machine
hot glue gun/glue
I started with planning in Microsoft Word. I knew my pages were 9x9, so I set 9x9 as the page size and then added a circle to determine how big it could be, while leaving enough room for the selector to go all the way round its edge. The circle ended up being approx. 7 inches in diameter and each slice (there are 8) is approx. 2.5 inches at the top. Then I cut the page and wheel to size. I used the circle I made in Word to draw the sections onto, so I'd know how big each item needed to be. Then I cut out each item. Using "Insert Shapes" in Word, I inserted a lightning bolt and a circle (for the sun).
Once everything was cut out, the first sewing step is to sew the section lines onto your wheel. I used my rotary mat - first time using the diagonal lines - and my blue fabric pen to draw the sections, then I sewed over those. The blue came off with dampened cloth, but I actually ended up flipping it over and using the other side. Then I pinned my pieces into their sections and started sewing.
I was particularly proud of sewing this tornado - I tried to evoke the whirling, chaotic lines of a tornado!
For the rainbow, I sewed a white background shape and then hot glued the colors onto it. I also hot glued the rain drops. I had trouble cutting snowflakes that tiny, so I used the triple stitch function of my sewing machine and white thread and made them that way.
Then I moved on to making the selector. I realized I needed stiffened felt to make this work better, so I made the selector out of stiffened felt, and I backed the weather circle with it as well. The selector was really hard for me, for some reason, but I just used trial and error with a piece of paper before cutting the stiffened felt. I really wanted the center of the selector to be vinyl, so I went to Hobby Lobby and thought it would be a pain to ask them to cut the vinyl I found in the home decorating fabric, so I had the idea of using a cheap clear makeup/pencil bag and that worked great!
I cut the center out of the selector and then I sewed the vinyl to the selector. Once I had all the elements ready, I punched a hole in the center of the wheel, at the point of the selector and in the center of the background page. Then I inserted a brad through all the pieces.
I considered putting the words "Today's Weather Is..." at the top of the page, but I decided to leave it blank, so it can go in more directions. Henry can choose his favorite weather or what weather he expects tomorrow or the weather that best corresponds with winter, etc.
I love how it turned out. I think it's so fun to turn the selector!
Since this one is best seen in action, I tried to take a video and show how the page works!
1 sheet of white felt (to make the boxes behind the letters)
Approx. 72 in. of both sides of velcro
scissors
sewing machine
rotary mat/cutter (optional)
hot glue gun
31 colors of felt - the good news is, they can be tiny scraps of felt
💡 IDEA - make these pages after making all your other quiet book page,
so you'll have plenty of scraps left to use.
Step 1: Planning - determine how big your quiet book pages are (mine are 9x9 inches). Here's what I did to start from scratch - open Word and set my page size to 8x8 - I think I did this so there would be some room around the edges. I made boxes that were 1.3 x 1.3 and that allowed 6 boxes across and 6 boxes down - which allows you to make 36 letters. (26 alphabet, 5 extra vowels, 5 letters you might need two of - especially of a child has a duplicate letter in their name). Inside the boxes, I made each letter in font "Arial Black", size 80.
Step 2: Print your template and cut out each letter.
Step 3: Cut out each letter. I did this by holding my paper template against the felt and cutting around it. You could trace the template and then cut. You could also try this method I saw on Pinterest (after I was done cutting mine out)
Here are all my letters cut out - I decided to do two of each vowel, and now, I wish I had done 2 of the more popular consonants.
Step 4: Use your rotary cutter to cut the white felt into 31 __ size boxes.
Step 5: Cut your one side of your Velcro into 31 pieces that will fit onto the white squares. (The other side of the velcro will remain long. I think I put the soft side on the back of the letters and the other side on the gray background).
Step 6: Sew the pieces of Velcro onto the backs of the 31 white squares.
Step 7: Sew the long strips onto the gray background. I did 6 strips on the alphabet side and three strips on the spelling side.
Step 8: Hot glue the letters onto the white squares.
Step 9: Enjoy your work!
On this side, Henry can practice spelling his name, practice spelling simple words, sort the letters by vowel/consonant or by color families.
