Quiet Book - Matching Game

I found some dump truck buttons on Etsy and thought they would make a perfect matching game for Kellan's Quiet Book.  Actually a pretty hard matching game - they're all the same shape, same wheels, but all have two different colors on them.  My next challenge was that there weren't enough different color combinations.  So I problem solved that #likeaboss and used markers to make some new color combos.  

I had to really think through this one.  For the game to be fun more than once, you have to be able to move the pieces around, so I cut out a lot of little squares.  I sewed Velcro to half the squares and hand sewed a truck button to half the squares and then sewed the Velco squares and the truck squares together.  Then I cut flap pieces, sewed those to the background pages, finally I sewed Velcro under the flaps.

My mom and I played it and it was very fun!

Thinking of making a Quiet Book - an assortment of felt will help get you started!

Quiet Book - Snail Lacing Page

For this project you'll need:

Felt: 9x9 blue, 9x9 purple (any shell color), scrap green, light pink (any body color) and white
pony beads
shoe lace
needle and thread
sewing machine
googly eyes (or you can make them out of black and white felt)

Steps:
1. Cut out felt pieces
2. Sew spiral shape onto shell (large circle piece of felt).  I used the triple stitch feature on my sewing machine so it would show up better
3. Hand sew the pony beads
4. Sew the felt pieces down
5. Sew the shoe lace to the bottom and cover it with another layer of grass.
6. Add googly eyes If you're making a Quiet Book - an assortment of felt is a great way to get started!

Learning Your Name Quiet Book Page

This is a pretty cool page!  To make the "paper" I used different colors of thread in my sewing machine.  On white felt, I sewed the top and bottom lines with a tight stitch and then the widest possible stitch for the middle.  Then I cut my nephew's name out of a double layer of felt, then I stitched them together, to give the letters a bit of weight.

The other side of the spread was a little pocket, with a snap closure to store the letters.

 

Quiet Book - Snowman Dress Up

Since I was giving this gift at Christmas, I wanted to include either a Santa or Snowman page and I settled on Snowman. I came up with a dress the snowman concept and made a bunch of hats, scarves and a few ties for the snowman to wear. Here was the planning phase:

I just copied and pasted hats I found online to use as templates for my hats.  I knew I wanted the hats to look super cute and realistic, so that meant a lot of detail work and hand-sewing.  I made a polka dot tie by adding French knots (first time doing them) and it turned out so cute!!!

Then I ordered really wide Velcro and made the entire snowman out of Velcro. Then I used stick on Velcro dots on the back of the hats and on the closet page.

For the background, I made snow on the ground and a few pine trees.  I made an adjoining page with shelves to store the hats.

For this Project you'll need: 

light blue felt sheet

white felt sheet

dark green felt sheet

brown felt sheet

colorful felt scraps (for the hats)

orange scrap (for the carrot nose)

wide Velcro

sticky back Velcro dots

needle and embroidery thread

sewing machine

Two small black buttons (for the eyes, optional)

snowflake brads (optional)

                                                 

If you're thinking of making a quiet book, an assortment of felt will help you get started!

Quiet Book - Cover

I hadn't found a place yet to put a crane or dirt mover or trash truck - all vehicles Kellan enjoys - AND I knew I wanted Kellan's name on the cover - so I pictured a crane lifting one of the letters into his name and I loved the idea.  I made my template in Word, like usual (just piecing together the different elements I envisioned with shapes or graphics I found online):

Then I cut out the elements and tried to figure out the mechanics of the crane.  I had a larger brad and I ended up using that.  I also sewed pieces of felt together for the movable crane piece, to make it sturdier.  The stick on felt letters I had were a bit too big to fit on the page, while making the crane make sense, so I cut the letters down slightly - you have to be all about problem-solving!  One other thing to note on the cover is the center of the tires, I used a silver, textured leather, which I had scraps from another project.  Any chance you have to add depth or texture in a Quiet Book makes a big impact and definitely adds visual interest.

If you're thinking about making a Quiet Book - buying an assortment of felt is a great place to start!

Christmas Cookies for Santa - Quiet Book

For this Project you'll need:

1 sheet of the following colors: dark blue, medium green, light brown, medium brown, yellow, white, red, light green

needle and thread

scissors

sewing machine

velcro

embellishments

Noah's Ark and Rainbow Quiet Book Pages

The Noah's Ark page was one of the easiest to make - I used Microsoft Word to make a simple pattern for myself.  (I set the page size to 9x9) and then created this pattern with shapes.

For This Project You'll Need:

blue or gray felt - sky

blue felt - water

dark brown felt - middle piece

black felt - for the inside

light brown felt for the boat/roof pieces/ramp pieces - I found this textured felt at JoAnn Fabric

scissors

sewing machine

animals - see below

Sewing steps:

FIRST - sew on the ocean piece (to the sky/background piece) - I sewed around the edge first and then sewed a few wavy lines in the middle and I love that it adds dimension and looks like waves

SECOND - Sew the dark brown middle piece

THIRD - sew the black piece (this will be what shows when the ramp is open)

FOURTH - add the boat and roof pieces - on the boat top, I sewed about an inch down and two inches on each side. to make a pocket where the animals could stand and left the middle open)

FIFTH - sew the ramp, just across the bottom (you cold add felt or a snap, but I just left it plain, felt sticks to each other fairly well)

I had planned to create little, intricate plush or finger puppet animals, but I was feeling the need to simplify where I could, so when I found these felt animal stickers at Michaels, I thought they were perfect.

I wanted to create a rainbow page opposite the Noah's Ark page, since it's part of the story - I decided to make it multi purpose - a zipper to practice and a pouch to store the animals.  I cut strips of felt to make the rainbow and sewed each to an 8x8 background, then sewed that to a 9x9 page background.

Planning to make your own Quiet Book - get started with a felt assortment:

Pie Weaving Quiet Book Page

This one came together really easily.

For this Project you'll need:
a background page of felt (mine is 9 x 9 and white)
2 sheets of tan felt
1 sheet of red felt (or whatever filling color you choose)
pinking shears
scissors
sewing machine
hot glue gun




Step 1:  Cut out a circle with your filling color of felt.  Mine was 6.46 x 6.46 (I created a circle template in Word.

Step 2:  Cut a freehand crust, that will fit around the outer edge of your filling circle.

Step 3:  USING PINKING SHEARS, cut out six strips  - two long and 4 short (the long will be the diameter of the filling circle, then measure on your filling circle for the short pieces).

Step 4:  (Optional) I cut out little red circles - making it a cherry pie!  I think it adds a lot of dimension.

Step 5:  Sew everything together.  The filling to the background page.  Then pin your six strips under the crust and sew around the edge of the crust, using a zigzag stitch REMEMBER TO SEW ONLY ONE END OF THE STRIPS.

Step 6:  Hot glue embellishments to your filling.

This page introduces weaving to your child and is good practice of fine motor skills and logic.

Planning to make a Quiet Book - get started with a pack of felt:

Quiet Book - Buckle Puppy's Collar

This is a pretty simple page to put together - I cut everything out without a pattern (which is unusual for me).  I found faux fur at Hobby Lobby near the felt and loved it for the puppy ears.

For this project you'll need:

light brown felt

dark brown felt

oatmeal felt

faux fur

black felt (small amount)

white felt (small amount)

white felt for background (my pages are cut to 9x9 inches)

buckle

ribbon

scissors

sewing machine

hot glue gun

Sew around the big pieces and hot glue the smaller pieces.  I just sewed the tops of the ears, so they can flop around and lift up.

Thinking about making a Quiet Book? Buy an assortment of felt to get you started!

Quiet Book - Solar System

To figure out colors and design for each planet, I used different pictures I found online, this is one of them.

For this project you'll need:

felt in various colors

scissors

needle

thread

sewing machine (optional)

brown, rock-like beads

18 magnets - I got mine from Hobby Lobby and got the strongest magnets available, because they have to "stick" through two layers of felt.

The solar system pages are fairly simple overall - 

Step 1: 

Cut out three circles for each planet.

Step 2: 

Sew two of those circles together, making sure to put a magnet in the middle.

Step 3: 

Decorate each planet with felt pieces and hot glue.

 Step 4: 

Cut out a sliver of sun for the edge of the page.

Step 5: 

Sew the sun and the 9 orbit lines to the black felt pages - I used my sewing machine for this.  In hindsight, I probably should have practiced more to make sure they all ended up in a more uniform curved line - I got better the last few planets!

Step 6: 

Sew the third circle for each planet to their respective orbit lines, making sure to put a magnet in between the circle and the background page.

Step 7: 

Sew on beads to make up the asteroid belt.

Although it's not 100 % to scale and scientifically accurate, I like that there are a lot of things to learn from these pages.  The order of the planets, their sizes, relative to each other, what an orbit is, what an asteroid belt is.  If a parent is around, they can help learn the names of the planets and can help the child speculate about why earth looks blue and green and why some planets have rings.

Are you planning to make a Quiet Book? Get started with an assortment of felt: