Quiet Book

I found this "Quiet Book," aka "Busy Book" at a rummage sale for 25CENTS!  What a score!  I made 2 of these types of books for my niece & nephew but picassa has sorted my pictures somewhere I can't find them to blog, of course.  These are such a labour of love to make, but so very worth it.

I cannot lay claim to making this book, I do not know who made it but I applaud their efforts.  It seems to be made from remnants & scrap fabric.  It looks to be well loved, some of the pieces are missing but it looks like it would still be appealing to any child. 

As always, click on any picture to enlarge.

Check out all the fun fabrics, all different qualities & types

Tie my shoe

Braid my hair...Put your hand in my mitten

Zip, now look inside...What time is it? (there is plastic hands on that clock to spin)

Make my face...Match the shapes

Fill my cars...Count the wheels

Hang the clothes...Tie my bow

Button my coat...Try my pockets

I can count...up to ten

Match the colours

It is on my list to restore the missing pieces of this book so my new little one will be able to enjoy it.  As with any activity a small child manipulates, they need to be adult supervised with common sense.  These home-made books do not come with safety certifications or recall notices.  If you choose to make a book for a child, please please please, advise the parents to be vigilant to choking hazard etc by supervising appropriate use of these fun manipulative little books.

Baby Shower Autograph book

My good friend recently hosted a baby shower for me.  It was a lot of fun & I really wanted to preserve a fun book of signatures from my guests.  This baby is expected early December 2012 so we planned to have the shower first & then a "meet the baby" tea late in January or early February 2013.  December is rife with holiday busyness, cold & flus and it just made sense to straddle the holiday rather than deal with all it's craziness.

 I found this old card kit in my stash.  It is still cute but quite dated looking, "Paper Magic, you make the Magic" by Sue Dreamer.  I Made a template, & used my Bind-it-all to punch 8 holes in the cards.

 I used some heavy cardboard to make the covers same as how I made the circle smash book.  I covered the covers with glue stick & "Max & Whiskers Basic Grey paper."  The baby nursery & shower theme is baby animals or zoo animals so this fit perfectly.  The covers are 1/8" larger than the card envelope size since I did punch a few envelopes to use as pockets inside the book.  I used the BIA corner rounder to round the outer corners.  Hockey tape sealed the edges of the covers nicely.  Tip:  Use sharp scissors to cut hockey tape, it is very sticky!

 Here is how it looks inside

 All the embellishments were premade as part of the card kit.  I had some making memories fabric tape that I used to cover the preprinted credits on the back of each card.  I used a bit of smash tape to note the date of the event and sticky notes to reserve the first & last pages for notes of the fun shower & tea party details.

I hope this post inspires you to have a look at your stash & think of new ways to enjoy using it.

Teenage Sleep Shorts

I've been slowly digging my way through my sewing pile.  I had a cheap McCalls patterm that said it is sized for teen or men's small.  Grumble grumble grumble, don't get me started on McCalls pattern sizing!  I got stung, AGAIN!  The silly thing is, I should know better by now since I have been stung by this lesson a few times.  McCalls patterns have always had crazy generous sizing. 

 I sometimes trace a pattern to save the multisize or simplify it.  I tape it onto a window & then tape stretcher paper over it & get busy tracing.  Stretcher paper is a little known secret of quilters that work in health care.  Some doctors clinics or hospitals will give you the end of the roll if you ask.  You can get a whole roll for very cheap from your local hospital.  I can't recall the price now since the roll I have is many years old & it goes a long way.  Remember to mark the cutting lines, grain lines, notches, and dots if you need them.  I was able to trace off the fly & pocket markings since they weren't needed.

 Here is the finished shorts, modeled by my 14 year old son who is as tall as me. 

 As you can see, they are clearly HUGE!  Oh well, they're comfy & he will remember them a long time since they will be in use for a few years I suspect.

I hope I've made you laugh, with this post, I do now but I wasn't so pleased at the time.