Quiet Books!

I've been busy!  For Easter, I wanted my boys to have quiet books to take with them to church.  I finished with two days to spare!  (Nothing like a deadline to keep one productive).

I pretty much had no idea what I was doing, so I drew TONS of inspiration from Pinterest and Google Image searches.  Apparently I don't like coming up with my own original ideas.  I like other people to do that and then I copy them. :)

I created a secret board on Pinterest (since I figured all my friends didn't want their pages overloaded with millions of quiet book pages that looked pretty much the same).  "The Quiet Book Blog" was pretty much AMAZING in providing inspiration.  I relied on it heavily, as well as the blog "Serving Pink Lemonade."  I finally narrowed my choices based on simplicity, since my kids are only 16 months old and can't work snaps or buttons yet, and since I only had two weeks to work with - no complicated hand embroidery for me!  Almost everything was done by machine and I used lots of Heat N Bond.

Wanna see them?  Yippee!  Here they are:

Covers:
I made these last, and I must admit - they are mostly for myself.  I was inspired by THIS quilt a long time ago and have been dying to try out the technique for awhile now.  I figured the extra texture would be perfect for my cover.  I really like how the white one turned out - probably because the flannel I used was slightly higher quality and frayed better, partly because of the color placement and design.

Name Pages:
Those Ns and Xs were especially hard to sew by machine.  Too bad each of my kids has one in their names!  :)  I also added ribbon to the zippers to make them easier to grab.

Shapes:
I added a tiny bit of batting to the shapes to make them a little puffier. 

I used Pellon extra firm non-fusible interfacing for my pages (copying "Serving Pink Lemonade").  The lady at Joanns seemed to think it was too stiff, but I kind of like how sturdy it makes my books.  I made the pages 7 x 8.5 inches ("Serving Pink Lemonade" style), which in hindsight makes for REALLY small pieces.  Yowza.

Barn:
I was mostly inspired by THIS barn.  Pattern for this page can be found HERE.  Those are little finger puppets hiding inside.  Remember how the smaller page size meant for smaller pieces?  Yeah, the first attempt at finger puppets barely fit on my babies' fingers, so I had to make a second set. :)

Houses:
I was going to make up my own house, but then I ended up copying THIS one because I liked it the best.  The windows and doors open up to reveal a member of our family.
I printed our pictures on fabric (using the "freezer paper method").  I found THIS post, which teaches how to make homemade "Bubble Jet" - thus making your fabric washable and colorfast.  I spent a whole bunch of money and time making a solution and then tested it out on the label I made for my Valor Quilt.  I printed one copy with the solution and one without.  Then I washed both labels.  I was dissappointed when I pulled them out of the wash and BOTH labels had faded dramatically - the red had turned yellow and the blue was almost completely gone.  So sad.  So for the quiet books, I just printed on normal fabric and now I just have to pray it never needs to be washed!

Beads:
This one was the simplest page to make.  Just slide the beads on the ribbon.  Inspiration HERE.

I-Spy:
I came up with this one all on my own!  I didn't want to buy special vinyl just for this project, especially since I only needed a tiny amount, so I made my own using packing tape!  It was a good idea, until it came time to sew through it.  My poor sewing machine handled it fine, but I'm pretty sure my needle needs to be replaced again.  I was completely finished with it and handed it to the boys to test it out, when it ripped!  Of course, the packing tape vinyl didn't hold up well with all the tiny holes my machine punched into it.  SO I threw that page out and started over fresh - this time using liberal amounts of hot glue.  That baby is NOT falling apart on me again!
It's filled with rice, 3D stickers of woodland creatures and cars (with tape on the back to keep them from sticking to things), beads, and some buttons.

p.s. What does that shape look like to you?  It's supposed to by a magnifying glass, but I suppose a backwards Q (for "question") would work too...

Tree:
Inspiration/Pattern found HERE.  Luckily, I didn't have to sew that tree down, thanks to my Heat N Bond.  :)

There are pieces in the pocket for...
Spring

Summer

Fall

and Winter (The snow clumps were my own addition.  Around here our trees aren't just bare in the winter, they are heavy laden with snow.)

Rocket:
Inspired by THIS post (pattern included).  I considered making THIS one, but decided against it.  The rocket slides along the ribbon.

Fish:
I think my original inspiration for the fish was THIS post, and then THIS one.
I was pretty proud of myself for figuring out a cheap way to make a fishing pole - I used a leftover corn dog stick!  The fishing pole has a magnet stuck to the end of it and the fish have magnets sewn into them.  My first attempt at fish involved making them out of the same felt as the rest of the quiet book.  However, the felt was so thick that the magnets couldn't pick anything up through them.  SO I had to start over with regular fabric, which was MUCH harder to sew at this size.  Ah well.  I still like this page.

Robot:
Original inspiration HERE.  Although I really wish I could have made something like THIS.
The arms/legs are elastic, and the gears turn.  The hubby says this looks more like an alien.  What do you think?

And finally, the backs.  I just sewed two pieces of flannel onto the back of my last page.
Peak Hour Cars

and some of my last bits of Letters

I attached the pages by sewing them together back to back and then punching holes in them (HARD to do through three layers of flannel!) for a ribbon tie.

We'll try these out on Sunday and see if they can keep two 16 month old babies entertained!

Linking up!

Sew Thinky: Sewing gifts

This weeks' Sew Thinky Thursday question is:

Who do you like to sew for the most?

That's an easy, yet complicated question.  The answer is:  Anyone who will let me!  I've been really into embellishing towels or burp cloths for weddings or baby showers.

If the baby shower is for a really good friend (too bad most of my friends had their first babies before I got into quilting), I'll make a quilt.

But when it comes to full-size quilts, those so far have only been for family.  Making a full size quilt is a HUGE investment and takes a lot of time and even more money.  Only the most important people in my life get quilts from me - at this point.  I'd love to be good enough/fast enough/stashed enough to make quilts for other people someday.  :)

Of course, I'm always looking for excuses to make something for my kids.  And I'm always on the lookout for cute boy fabric.

Looking back, it seems like the most gifted person so far has been my sister.  She's graduated from college and lives in a little place of her own, so naturally she needs lots of stuff to put in it.  And when she gets married, I'll just have to make another quilt for her. ;)

Of course, I DID recently make this donation quilt for our local Veteran's Home.  It has been my first experience making something big (twin size) to give to someone I'll probably never meet.

 I have loved working on it, and I'm sad to give it away.  But when you really come down to the cold, honest truth you find out that I really sew for one person.  Myself.  I do it because I love to do it.  Those people who are recipients of my crazy hobby are just lucky.

Linking up!

p.s. In case you haven't heard already - my Quilt of Valor is part of the Something New Sampler over at The Cute Life.  There is still ONE DAY left to hop over and vote for your favorite finish.  Voting ends at midnight on Friday, March 22nd.

Sew Thinky Thursday: Bad Habits

I've missed a few weeks worth of Sew Thinky posts.  Oops.  A few weeks ago, the topics were about sewing friends and guilds.  Although I have lots of friends, and some of them even sew, I felt like I couldn't really call them my "sewing friends."  Although some of them have voiced their opinions that they would like that to change.  We really need to get together soon and teach each other our crafty skills!  (wink, wink)

Last week the question was about our favorite Kona Solid colors.  I meant to write a quick post claiming Lagoon and Leprechaun as my favorite colors, with some form of white as my go-to color.  To be completely honest, I usually have a sizeable stash of bleached muslin on hand.  It's cheap, but so far it has been serving me well.   However, I've been using purely Kona Solids in my Storm at Sea quilt and I can definitely tell a difference.  Kona is amazing.

And now for this week's question:

Bad sewing habits. Do you have them? Share with us, what are your worst habits when it comes to sewing?

I've been thinking about this.   And then last night I had a little... discussion with my husband about my habit of leaving the iron on.  I thought for sure I was getting better at not leaving it on all the time, but it turns out I still have lots of room to improve.  I never leave my iron or its cord within reach of the kids, but I have a bad habit of forgetting to turn it off.  Sometimes it will stay on all day long (cringe).  What about you?  What are your bad habits?

Also, if you haven't already - there is still time to go and vote for your favorite finish in the Something New Sampler!

Here's my quilt:

Time to vote!

Voting is up on the Something New Sampler Quilts!  Go check out the awesome finishes and vote for your favorite!  (Just remember to click on the button ABOVE the quilt you choose.)

Vote HERE.

If you missed it, click on the picture to get to my final post:

Something New: A Finished Valor Quilt

It's finished!  Thanks to those who have patiently stuck it out through my millions of posts on this project. :)  And welcome to any new visitors from Amy's link-up!

I put the final stitches on my Something New Sampler quilt last night.  I wasn't required to finish it completely in order to meet the deadline, but I was so close I decided just to push myself to finish.  Which I did - with one day to spare!

I'll be donating this quilt to the new Veterans Memorial Home that will be opening in my city soon.  I put a TON of time and effort into this quilt, so I feel a little sad giving it away, but I'm sure it will be well loved.  It helps to know that most of the fabric (and all of the batting) was donated to me by good friends who will be happy to hear that their kindness is being put to good use.  I know it is going to be very, very different from most of the quilts that are being donated, but I LOVE that I got to have the opportunity to try new things.  This quilt made it possible to try them out when otherwise I probably wouldn't have bothered.  Amy's quilt-along was SO FUN!  I even tried lots of new quilting methods.  (For those who are curious, I added an update to THIS post on how the rest of my QAYG turned out.)

I tried to get some good pictures during my limited nap-time window.  I hope they do the quilt justice.  Here we go:

A couple close-ups.  The bright light outside really helped the quilting to show!

 I forgot to account for the wider seam allowance and squaring up that was going to happen when I attached the quilted sections, so some of my borders ended up a little wonky.  Oops.

I wanted to be as economical (and simple) as possible, so I bought a sheet to use for the backing and then did an easy fold over binding.  The sheet doesn't necessarily match all that white, but somehow I still think it works.  The backing is sewn down every 15 inches or so.  I didn't want to add too much more stitching to the front.  It's pretty loose, but I think it will hold up.  We'll have to see how it looks after being washed and dried.  I'll also be watching to see if those seams created from attaching the quilted blocks soften up at all.  EDIT:  After washing, the back still looks great.  I think it's going to be fine.

An obligatory bed shot, to prove how big it is:

And here are a few more, just for fun!

Quilt stats:

Started: January 2013

Finished: March 13, 2012

Fabrics:  Everything is from my stash.  Most of the fabrics I used were given to me by a friend (particularly the red stars and the blue stars used in each block).  The batting was also donated by a friend and pieced together.  The only thing I payed for was the white fabric, the backing, and the 2,500 or so yards of thread I went through (YIKES!)

Finished size: About 76 x 91 (before washing)

Recipient:  Utah State Veterans Home

Previous posts about individual blocks HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE

Previous post about quilting and QAYG method HERE 

The quilt is in the wash right now.   (Gotta get all those pencil markings off.)  Which means there will have to be a few more pictures once it comes out of the drier.  ;) 

EDIT:  It's washed and dried and is now crinkly!  I know there are lots of people who love the crinkly look but to be completely honest, I'm usually disappointed when I take my quilts out of the drier and the crinkliness has overwhelmed the intricate quilting designs.  I really love the way my quilts look BEFORE washing.  But then when you step back and look at the whole thing, it's still the same quilt. 

AFTER washing:

I'm linking up with Amy at The Cute Life.  Starting Friday, March 15th, there will be VOTING for all who finished a project.  Go check it out!!  Edit:  Vote HERE.  Make sure to click on the button ABOVE the quilt you choose!  Voting closes on Friday, March 22nd.