Category: letter a craft

Hello friends, just to give you a heads up of where I’m coming from with this.  I ran a giveaway blog for a few years, I have a small business that I’ve hosted giveways for, and I love love love entering giveaways I find online. 

1st – Consider what you are giving away  

2 – Tell them what they are entering to win.  

3 – Make entering super easy!  Like the post, follow you, tag two friends… if you like living life on the edge, have them share the giveaway post in their story.

4 – Keep the giveaway running time frame small, and tell them exactly when it ends and how a winner can expect to be notified. 

5 – Reward people for sharing with friends (Not necessary, but gives you a solid visibility boost) 

6 – Partner with an establish account. 

7 – Take a good picture and add Giveaway text to the image

  

Anticipated Crafting Time for this project: 3-4 Hours

*NOTICE* This quiet book is recommended for children ages 0-2. All the pieces in this book are attached to the page for safety, but young children should still be supervised while playing with it, and pieces should be checked for integrity and to make sure they are well attached to the page after each use.

The “My First Weather Book” includes instructions to make the following quiet book pages:
• A front cover for the book.
• A rainy ribbon tactile page, with multiple ribbon strands and an inverse cloud pocket.
• A sunshine and clouds page with an attached, magnetic, cloud to cover or remove from the sun.
• A peek-a-book leaf page, with three leaf flaps hiding bugs.
• A pull up flower page, with attached pull strings for three flowers.
• A thunderstorm page, with two elastic bolts of lightning that can be pulled down from the clouds.
• A snowflake page, with three turnable (not removable) snowflakes.

Supplies Needed:

Fat Quarter of Printed Fabric From Spoonflower

• Printed fabric for the pages and pieces (Available here through Spoonflower, I would suggest getting the Cotton Canvas fabric for the best durability)
• Iron on fixative lining (For the smaller play pieces)
• Felt Lining (For the smaller play pieces)
• Thin Elastic (a small amount for the lightning bolts and cover button closure)
• 4 Buttons (one for the front cover, three for the snow flakes)
• Multiple Blue Ribbons and a Green Ribbon (For the rain cloud and sunshine page, and for the growing flowers page)
• 3 small Beads (for the snowflake page)
• Two strong magnets (magnets will be sewn securely into the book, but be sure to practice magnet safety and do not let your children swallow them.)

• A Sewing Machine (Can also be hand sewn)
• A Needle
• Thread
• Sewing Pins
• Scissors
• An Iron
• An Ironing Board or Ironing Surface
• A Candle
• Matches to Light the Candle

*Note* A few minor design updates may have been made to the fabric & movable pieces for better usability.

Step One:

Iron the printed fabric. Then take the printed fabric and cut out the 4 large rectangular pages of the book, each section should have two pages still attached in the middle, and when they are cut out they should look like the image to the right.

Put pages aside.

Step Two:

Take the leftover fabric with the various smaller pieces for the quiet book and make sure you DO NOT CUT OUT the individual pieces.

Follow the instructions on the iron on fixative lining to connect the smaller play pieces to the felt fabric for stronger durability.

SPECIAL NOTE: take one of the small magnets you have been provided with and lay it on the iron on fixative under where the “cloud to cover the sun” fabric will be so that it is between the fixative and the top printed fabric layer. This will seal the magnet into your cloud piece and you’ll need it for a later step.

Start by taking the fabric with the smaller quiet book pieces and cut the iron on fixative lining and the felt to match the size and shape of the fabric.

Next layer them with the felt on the bottom, the iron on fixative in the middle, and the fabric on top (with the printed side facing away from the fixative).

You may want a disposable cloth, or bit a excess fabric for this part as any overhang of the iron on fixative will be sticky and will gunk up your iron or ironing board if they touch.

Set your iron to a medium setting and press it to the printed fabric holding it for three seconds before removing it and pressing the next section. Continue until the whole cloth has been ironed. Then flip your cloth over so the print side is down, and repeat the process. (Again you may want to use a cloth on this part to save your fabric and your iron if you have any overhang).

Step Three:

Take the fabric with the various quiet book pieces to your sewing machine and sew around each individual piece, keeping your thread just barely inside the line of the design.

When finished cut out each of the pieces.

Step Four:

Take your lightning bolts and sew an inch long strip of elastic to the top of each bolt.

Step Five:

Pin the top part of your elastic from step four to the top of the page with the dark storm clouds. Layer the dark storm clouds cutout over the printed storm clouds on the page and pin in place.

Step Six:

Sew around the left, top, and right part of the dark storm clouds securing them, and the top of the lightening bolt elastics to the page.

Step Seven:

Flip over the page with the lightning bolts, and take your second small magnet. Lay it over where the smiling sun would be, and use a small square of the discarded fabric from your “piece swatch” to make a square around the magnet. Pin it into place, then sew around it, securing the magnet to the page behind the sun.

Step Eight:

Take the large cloud piece (that you ironed and sewed the other magnet into) and choose one of the blue ribbons. Cut a strand from it about four inches long. Hem the edge and sew it to the bottom, back part of the cloud.

Place your cloud so that its covering the smiling sun (aligning the magnets) and take the other edge of the ribbon and pin it to the top of page with the smiling sunshine. It will be sewn when the pages of the book are sewn together.

Put the page aside.
 

Step Nine:

Take the book page with the leaves and grass.

Match up the three cut out leaves with the leaves on the book. Sew across the top of the leaves, securing them to the page and creating fold ups in the book.

Step Ten (There are two options for creating this page):

Option One – Pull Up Flowers (Easier)(Not Pictured): Take your green ribbon, and cut it into three strips, with each strip being between 3-4 inches.

Hem the top edge of the green ribbon and sew a flower to the top of it. Repeat for each of the three flowers.

Line up the bottom part of each of the ribbons with the bottom of the grass page. Take your grass cut out and sew around the left, bottom and right of it, sewing both the grass and the bottom of the ribbons into place. You have now created a pocket and pull up flowers.

Option Two – Button Hole Flowers (Pictured):Take a thicker blue ribbons and cut three separate two inch strips from it. Then take your green ribbon and cut three strips from it, each strip being 3-4 inches long.

Sew the bottom of the blue ribbon to the top of the green ribbon strip. Where the two ribbon colors overlap sew one of your flowers. (Repeat for all three flowers)

Set your sewing machine to sew a button hole, and take your quiet book page with grass on the bottom of it. Sew six button holes in the blue sky, about where the lines in the demo image to the right show.

Then take your extra piece of grass (the grass pocket), and sew three more button holes where the demo picture on the right shows.

Take one of your blue ribbons with the flower attached and carefully thread the blue part of the ribbon into the bottom button hole (on the sky part of the page) and out of the top button hole. Then take one of your bee cutouts and sew the bee to the top of the blue ribbon, making a pull string that can pull the flower up, but won’t pull through the book.

Repeat with the other two flowers.

Next line up the grass pocket piece with the grass on the page and sew around the left, bottom and right of the piece, securing the grass pocket to the page.

Now thread the bottom part of the green ribbon so it goes behind the grass pocket and comes out the button hole at the bottom.

Take a brown “seed” piece, and sew the seed to the bottom part of the green ribbon, again creating a pull string that won’t pull free of the book. Repeat with the other two flowers.

You now should be able to pull on the bee to make the flowers “grow” or lift up from the grass, and pull on the seeds to make the flowers tuck back down in the grass.

Step Eleven:

Take your blue ribbons and cut them into four inch strips, I suggest cutting the end on an angle. You may cut as many or as few as you like to create the rain for the rain cloud.

Once your ribbons have been cut light your candle, then take each of the cut strips and move the ends of them towards the flame (without actually touching the strands to the flame) just get close enough to melt the fiber at the end to prevent fraying.

Step Twelve:

Line up your ribbons on the quiet book page with the white cloud in the middle of the page. I suggest having the thicker ribbons at the back and the thinner ribbons layered over the front.

Sew a line or two across the cloud and ribbons securing them into place.

Once they are secure cut off the excess ribbon at the top of the cloud.

Step Thirteen:

Take the remaining cloud cut out and lay it over the ribboned cloud. Sew around the left, top, and right of the cloud, leaving the bottom of it open so the rain can move around. (It also creates a fun, exploratory, pocket for little fingers. )

Step Fourteen:

Take your three snowflake cutouts and snip a small hole in the center of each. Insert a hollow bead into the center of each snowflake.

Then place the snowflakes the way you would like them on the dark blue page with the dots. Be sure to leave at least an inch margin around the edges of the page so the snow flakes don’t get sewn into the page when the book pages are being put together.

Sew the snowflakes into place with a needle and thread by starting in the back of the page, putting your needle through the hollow bead, then sewing through the button holes of one of your buttons. Thread your need through another of the button’s hole and back down through the hollow bead and your fabric. Repeat a few times before tying your thread in place. The bead in the center of your snowflake will allow the snowflake to turn and spin once sewn into place.

Repeat for all three snowflakes.

Step Fifteen: (Optional)

Take the front cover of the book and sew a button onto the right side of the page in the middle.

On the opposite side of the page (the back cover of the book) pin the small loop of elastic with the loop facing the print on the page and the edges of the elastic pinned at the edge of the page.

Step Sixteen:

Take the front cover of the book, and lay it face up, then take the page with the rain cloud, and the snowflakes and lay it face down over the top page so the printed side of each page is touching.

Pin in place. Make sure the rain from the rain cloud is tucked up into the page and won’t get sewn into the seam. Also make sure your elastic loop is facing in against the printed pages and only the edges of it are at the seam.

Starting at the bottom middle sew around the outside of the two pages, about a ⅜ inch from the edge, leave about a four inch gap in the bottom of the book from where you began your sewing to where you end it.

Step Seventeen:

Cut off the extra fabric in the corners of your book (This will allow it to lay more flat when you flip the book).

Step Eighteen:

Using the four inch gap you left in step sixteen flip the page inside out, so that the printed side is out, take special care to press out the corners of the page as much as possible.

Iron your page flat.

Step Nineteen:

Fold up the edges of your four inch gap, and pin them in place. Then sew around the outside of your book page (about ¼ inch from the edge) Start and end your sewing in the same place so that your four inch gap is sealed shut.

Step Twenty:

Repeat steps for the other two pages of your quiet book. Make sure the ribbon for your magnet cloud gets sewn into place and secured into the book and that ribbons for the “flower” page are tucked up into the page and don’t get sewn into the seams when you are sewing your pages together.

Step Twenty-One: 

Line up the two sewn rectangular pages (that create the whole of your quiet book) and pin them in place so they completely overlap one another. Sew a straight line down the middle of your overlapped pages, securing the pages of the book together.

Congratulations, you are done! 🙂

Thank you so much for your purchase of this quiet book kit, if you found any of these instructions to be unclear or difficult please email me at [email protected] – I’d love to get them updated and clarified to the best of my ability.

Spot cleaning with a light detergent and a damp rag is the best way to clean your quiet book, but it should also hold up if you wash it in the washing machine on a gentle cycle. Air dry only.

Please let me know if you have any comments or additional questions.

Anticipated craft time: 4-5 Hours
This quiet book is recommended for children ages 4-8.

*Warning – This book contains small parts that may present a choking hazard for children under the age of 3.

The “My First Old Testament Book” includes instructions to make the following pages:
• A front cover for the book
• A “Match Up The Creation Days” page, with 7 snap on circles
• A “Help Style Queen Esther’s Hair” page, with hair strands and hair clips to braid or style the hair
• A “Help Jonah Escape The Big Fish” page, with a whale with a zippered mouth pocket and a Jonah finger puppet
• A “Help Noah Gather The Animals” page, with an ark with a peek-a-book door and a pocket as well as three finger puppet animals (An elephant, giraffe, and a zebra)
• A “Help Ruth Gather The Wheat” page, with 3 strands of wheat and 3 hook and eyelet pairs.
• A “Help Weave Joseph’s Coat” page, with 5 different colored ribbons to weave.
• A back book cover with a pocket for holding excess pieces when the book is not in use.

Supplies Needed:
• Printed fabric for the pages and pieces (Available for purchase through Spoonflower, I recommend the Cotton Canvas fabric for the best durability)
• Iron on fixative lining (For the smaller play pieces)
• Felt Lining (For the smaller play pieces)
• Ribbon (Thicker pieces work better, these will be for weaving Joseph’s coat and for holding hair clips)
• Hair Clips
• Cording or Yarn (for hair)
• Elastic (Optional – small piece needed if you want the book to fasten shut)
• A Button (Optional – helps the book fasten shut)
• A Zipper (5 inch, if it’s longer the end can be trimmed, for the whales mouth)
• 3 Hook and Eyelet Pieces
• 7 Sewable Snaps

• A Sewing Machine (Can also be hand sewn)
• A Needle
• Thread
• Sewing Pins
• Scissors
• Seam Ripper
• An Iron
• An Ironing Board or Ironing Surface
• A Candle
• Matches (to light the candle)

*Note* A few minor design updates may have been made to the fabric & movable pieces for better usability.

Step One:

Iron the printed fabric. Then take it and cut out the 4 large rectangular pages of the book, each section should have two pages still attached in the middle, and when they are cut out they should look like the image to the right.

Put pages aside.

Step Two:

Take the leftover fabric with the various smaller pieces for the busy book and make sure you DO NOT CUT OUT the individual pieces.

Follow the instructions on the iron on fixative lining to connect the smaller play pieces to the felt fabric for stronger durability.

Start by taking the fabric with the smaller busy book pieces and cut the iron on fixative lining and the felt to match the size and shape of the fabric.

Next layer the three pieces of fabric. Felt should be on the bottom, iron on fixative should be in the middle, printed fabric should be on the top with printed side out (not facing the iron on fixative) You may want a disposable cloth, or bit a excess fabric for the next part as any over hang of the iron on fixative will be sticky and will gunk up your iron or ironing board if they touch.

Set your iron to a medium setting and press it to the printed fabric holding for three seconds before removing and pressing the next section. Continue until the whole cloth has been ironed. Then flip your cloth over so the printed side is down, and the felt side is up and repeat the process (again you may want to use a cloth on this part to save your fabric and your iron if you have any overhang).

Step Three:

Take the fabric with the various quiet book pieces to your sewing machine and sew around each individual piece, keeping your thread just barely inside the line of the design.

Special Note: For the finger puppets you only need to sew across the bottom section of them right now as you’ll sew around them to keep the layers in place when you attach the front and backs together.

Special Note: Sew around the yellow rectangle of the crown on the left, top and right sides, and follow the line of the crown on the bottom side, as you’ll need the full piece rather than just the crown shape for the page. See Image for example of where to sew:

Step Four:

Separate your sew-able snaps, and hand sew one side of the backing on each of the different circles representing the days of creation. (Note: Make sure you sew the correct or snappable side of the snap facing out – test with the other half of the snap to see if they fit together if you are unsure which side is correct).
  

Step Five:

Cut out all the pieces of fabric you have just sewn around. Note: Leave a large margin around the whales mouth (just cutting a line through the white of the two pieces, not cutting off the white, as you’ll need it to attach the zipper) and leaving all the yellow rectangle around the crown rather than cutting out the crown.

Step Six:

Take the page with the title “Match Up The Creation Days”. Hand sew the other side of the snaps used in step four to the inside of each of the creation day circles. (Note: Make sure you sew the correct or snappable side of the snap facing out – test with the other half of the snap to see if they fit together if you are unsure which side is correct).

Step Seven:

Take your hook and eyelets. Hand sew the eyelet part onto the back of each of the wheat pieces, attaching it in the upper middle section.

Step Eight:

Take your hook pieces and sew them in a line across the middle top of the page “Help Ruth Gather The Wheat”, leaving at least an inch of space on the right for a sewing margin when you’re putting the pages together.

Step Nine:

Take your cording or yarn and cut it into strips, making each strip about 7 inches long.

Step Ten:

Light your candle, then take each of the cut strips from step nine and move the ends of them towards the flame (without actually touching the strands to the flame) just get close enough to melt the fiber at the end to prevent fraying. Repeat on both sides of the strand with each of the strands.

Step Eleven:

Take your finished strands from step ten and lay them out horizontally, so the middle of each strand is over the crown on the page with the text “Help Queen Esther Style Her Hair.”

Then sew a vertical line across the middle of the strands, where they lay on the crown, anchoring them in place.

Take the extra piece of fabric with the crown, and cut out the bottom curve under the crown.

Push Esther’s hair down and to the sides of her face then lay the cutout crown over the strands and align it with the crown on the page, then carefully sew around the crown and over the hair strands sewing them into place.

Step Twelve:

Take a strand of ribbon and pin the ribbon in place to the right of Queen Esther, going from the top of the page to the bottom. Baste or pin the ribbon in place with the end dangling off the page. They will be sewn into the book when the pages are sewn together.

Step Thirteen:

Cut out the extra piece of Noah’s Ark. Carefully sew around the outside of the white square with the “x” and again sew a square just inside of the white square with an “x”.

When finished take a seam ripper and cut between the door lines you just sewed on the left, right, and top of the square, creating a flap to peer inside the Ark.

Step Fourteen:

Now take the Ark piece and line it up with the printed Ark on the book page. Sew around the bottom curve of the Ark to anchor it in place, but leave the top curve unsewn so that the finger puppet animals can slip inside.

Step Fifteen:

Cut out all the finger puppets. Pair the front sides and back sides together and sew around the left, top, and right sides of them, leaving your previous stitch to hold the bottoms and allow for little fingers to fit inside.

Step Sixteen:

Get your zipper. Lay it zipper side facing up. Then lay the bottom part of the whales mouth print side down over the top of the zipper. Line up the strait side of the whale with the strait edge of the zipper. Also align them so that the front lip of the whale is right by the silver tab on the bottom zipper strand.

Pin it in place so the zipper teeth are facing away from the strait edge of the whale (the zipper will look upside down), then sew a strait line about a ¼ inch from the zipper teeth.

Then fold down the whale piece, so that the print side is on the same side as the zipper. Sew another strait line with the fabric print side up. This will help your zipper lay more flat in the quiet book.

Repeat this process with the top part of the whale.

When finished zip the whale closed and cut off any excess white fabric from around the whales mouth. Leave the excess zipper in place.

Get the “Help Johan Escape the Big Fish” page and lay your zippered whale over the whale on that page. If you have excess zipper hanging off by the whales nose (if they had a nose and not a blowhole…) bend it under and tuck it back on itself, or clip it off. Sew around the whale, including over the folded under end of your zipper, and the back overhanging zipper.

You can leave the excess zipper fabric hanging off the page for now. It will be sewn in place when the pages are attached and can be trimmed after that point.

Step Seventeen:

Take your ribbons and cut them so that six of the ribbons are about 4 ¾ inches long, and five ribbon pieces are 6 inches long.

Light your candle and repeat step ten (the process you used for melting the hair strands) with the ribbons. Be sure to melt both sides of each ribbon.

When finished, starting at the bottom of the page, lay the shorter strands vertically across the page. Leaving a ¼ inch gap between each of strands, and make sure the text at the top of the page is visable. Pin in place or use a baste stitch to keep them aligned. They will be more securely sewn into the book when the book pages are sewn together.

Repeat that process with the longer strips, laying them horizontally across with page with the ¼ inch gap between each section. Pin/and or baste along the right side of the fabric so they will be held in place when the book pages are sewn together.

 

Step Eighteen: (Optional)

Take the front cover of the book and sew a button onto the right side of the page in the middle.

On the opposite side of the page (the back cover of the book) pin the small loop of elastic with the loop facing the print on the page and the edges of the elastic pinned at the edge of the page.

Step Nineteen:

Take the front cover of the book, and lay the page “Match Up The Creation Days” on top of it, so that the printed side of both pages are touching. Pin the page into place.

Make sure the elastic end are hanging off the page and the loop part is tucked in next to the print. Also pin down the excess piece of ribbon for the Queen Esther page so that it will also be sewn in at this point.

Step Twenty-One:

Starting at the bottom of the book, sew around the pages about ⅜ inch from the edge of your quiet book. Leave a four inch gap in the bottom of the book from where you began your sewing to where you end it.

Step Twenty-Two:

Clip off the extra fabric in the corners of your book (This will allow it to lay more flat when you flip the book).

Step Twenty-Three:

Using the four inch gap you left in step twenty-one flip the page, so that the print side is out, taking special care to press out the corners of the page as much as possible.

Step Twenty-Four:

Iron your pages flat. Fold up the edges of your four inch gap, and pin them in place. Then sew around the outside of your book (about ¼ inch from the edge) Start and end your sewing in the same place so that your four inch gap is sealed shut.

Step Twenty-Five: 

Repeat steps for your other two book pages. Before you flip these pages cut off the excess piece of zipper.

Step Twenty-Six:

Line up the two sewn rectangular pages (that create the whole of your quiet book) and pin them in place so they completely overlap one another. Sew a straight line down the middle of your overlapped pages, securing the pages of the book together.

Step Twenty-Seven:

Add all of your quiet book pieces to the book and congratulations, you are done! 🙂

Thank you so much for your purchase of this quiet book kit, if you found any of these instructions to be unclear or difficult please email me at [email protected] I’d love to get them updated and clarified to the best of my ability.

Spot cleaning with a light detergent and a damp rag is the best way to clean your quiet book, but it should also hold up if you remove all the excess pieces from it and wash it in the washing machine on a gentle cycle. Air dry only.

Please let me know if you have any comments or additional questions.

Click here to purchase this fabric through Spoonflower (I would suggest using the cotton canvas fabric for the best durability)

This quiet book is recommended for children ages 4-8.
Anticipated crafting time for this project: 4-5 Hours

Warning – This book contains small parts that may present a choking hazard for children under the age of 3.

The “My Farm Book” includes instructions to make the following pages:
• A front cover for the book
• An “Add Wheels To The Tractor” page, with a button on wheel and a snap on wheel.
• A “Help Plant or Pick Crops” page, with small pockets and 8 pull up and out vegetables.
• A “Play With The Farm Animals” page, with a fence “pocket” and three finger puppet animals.
• A barn page, with peek-a-boo barn door flaps.
• A “Help Braid My Tail” page, with a horse with strands of lacing to braid or play with.
• A “Help Pick The Apples” page, with four hook and eyelet apples and a basket “pocket” to hold them.

You will need the following supplies:
• Printed fabric for the pages and pieces needed for the book (Available for purchase through Spoonflower, I would suggest using the cotton canvas fabric for the best durability)
• Iron on fixative lining (for the smaller play pieces)
• Felt Lining (for the smaller play pieces)
• Cording or yarn (For the horses mane and tail)
• Elastic (if you want the book to button closed)
• Two Buttons (On for the large tractor wheel the other for the front cover of the book)
• 4 Hook and Eyelet Pairs (for the apples)
• 1 Sewable Snap (for the smaller tractor wheel)

• A Sewing Machine (Can also be hand sewn)
• A Needle
• Thread
• Sewing Pins
• Scissors
• Seam Ripper
• An Iron
• An Ironing Board or Ironing Surface
• A Candle
• Matches (to light the candle)

• Note – A few minor design updates may have been made to the fabric & movable pieces for better usability.

Step One:

Iron the printed fabric. Then take it and cut out the 4 large rectangular pages of the book, each section should have two pages still attached in the middle, and when they are cut out they should look like the image to the right.

Put pages aside.

Step Two:

Take the leftover fabric with the various smaller pieces for the busy book and make sure you DO NOT CUT OUT the individual pieces.

Follow the instructions on the iron on fixative lining to connect the smaller play pieces to the felt fabric for stronger durability.

Start by taking the fabric with the smaller busy book pieces and cut the iron on fixative lining and the felt to match the size and shape of the fabric.

Next layer the three pieces of fabric. Felt should be on the bottom, iron on fixative should be in the middle, printed fabric should be on the top with printed side out (not facing the iron on fixative) You may want a disposable cloth, or bit a excess fabric for the next part as any over hang of the iron on fixative will be sticky and will gunk up your iron or ironing board if they touch.

Set your iron to a medium setting and press it to the printed fabric holding for three seconds before removing and pressing the next section. Continue until the whole cloth has been ironed. Then flip your cloth over so the printed side is down, and the felt side is up and repeat the process (again you may want to use a cloth on this part to save your fabric and your iron if you have any overhang).

Step Three:

Take the fabric with the various quiet book pieces to your sewing machine and sew around each individual piece, keeping your thread just barely inside the line of the design.

Special Note: For the finger puppets you only need to sew across the bottom section of them right now as you’ll sew around them to keep the layers in place when you attach the front and backs together.

Step Four:

Cut out all the pieces of fabric you have just sewn around.

Step Five:

Separate your sew-able snap, and hand sew one side of the backing on the smaller tractor wheel. (Note: Make sure you sew the correct or snappable side of the snap facing out – test with the other half of the snap to see if they fit together if you are unsure which side is correct).

Step Six:

Set your sewing machine to sew a buttonhole, and find the larger tractor wheel. Sew a buttonhole in the middle of it using the button you have chosen for your tractor wheel as guide.

Step Seven:

Find the page titled “Add Wheels to the Tractor”. Sew your button in the middle of the bigger wheel on the page, and the back side of the snap on the smaller tractor wheel. (Note: Make sure you sew the correct or snappable side of the snap facing out – test with the other half of the snap to see if they fit together if you are unsure which side is correct).

Step Eight:

Take your hook and eyelets. Hand sew the eyelet part onto the back of each of the apple pieces. (opposite of what is shown in the pictures, this will make it easier for the apples to slide into the basket.)

Step Nine:

Take your hook pieces and hand sew them were you would like them in the tree on the page titled “Help Pick The Apples.” Make sure you leave at least an 1 ½ margin on the top and right side of the page for a seam when sewing the book pages together.

Step Ten:

Find the extra quiet book piece that matches the apple basket on the “Help Pick The Apples” page. Pin it in place and sew the left, bottom and right side of the basket in place, leaving the top open and creating a pocket for the “picked” apples to be placed in.

Step Eleven:

Take your cording  or yarn and cut it into 7 inch long strands to create the horse’s tail, take a handful of those strands (for the horse’s mane) and cut them in half so that they are 3 ½ inches long.

Step Twelve:

Light your candle, then take each of the cut strips from step eleven and move the ends of them towards the flame (without actually touching the strands to the flame) just get close enough to melt the fiber at the end to prevent fraying. Repeat on both sides of the strand with each of the strands.

Step Thirteen:

Take your finished 7 inch strands from step twelve and lay them out so the middle of each strand is over the rump of the horse on the page titled “Help Braid My Tail.”

Then sew a line across the strands anchoring them in place, before folding the top strands up.

Step Fourteen:

Take your finished 3 ½ inch strands from step twelve and lay them out over the horses head, arranging them so that they create a flowing mane for the horse. Sew a line along the side of the horse’s head to anchor them into place.

Lay the cutout horse over the strands and align it with the horse on the page, then carefully sew around the horse and over all the strands sewing them into place.

Optional Step: If you want your tail and mane hairs wrapping around the horse, bend them down and sew across the strands of the horse’s body to get them to lay flat and in place where you would like them to be.

Step Fifteen:

Take your square of cut out dirt and sew a line across the top and bottom of each of the faint brown lines on the page. You should have six lines sewn when finished. Next take your seam ripper or a pair of scissors and cut through the middle of each of those faint brown lines, creating small pockets for the vegetables to fit in.

Next take the book page titled “Help Plant or Pick Crops” and pin the brown square into place on the page. Sew two lines across the middle of the page, the first sew right above the second faint brown line, the second sew right above the third faint brown line where the fingers are pointing to in the picture. This will make it so the vegetables don’t slide down too low in the pocket when being put into the holes.

Step Sixteen:

Take the two cut out red doors and line them up on the page showing the barn so that they cover the wood and hay inside the barn. Sew a strip on the left side of the left door anchoring it to the page and a strip on the right side of the right door anchoring it to the page so that you have two peek-a-boo doors that can open and show the inside of the barn.

Step Seventeen:

Find all the finger puppet pieces. Pair the front sides and back sides together and sew around the left, top, and right sides of them, leaving your previous stitch to hold the bottoms and allow for little fingers to fit inside.

Step Eighteen:

Take your fence cutout and line it up on the page titled “Play With The Farm Animals.” Pin it into place and sew along the left, bottom and right of the fence creating a pocket for the finger puppet animals to slide into.

Step Nineteen: (Optional)

Take the front cover of the book and sew a button onto the right side of the page in the middle.

On the opposite side of the page (the back cover of the book) pin the small loop of elastic with the loop facing the print on the page and the edges of the elastic pinned at the edge of the page.

Step Twenty:

Take the front cover of the book, and lay it face up, then take the page with the tractor and the apple tree and lay it face down over the top page, so the printed side of each page is touching. (Make sure the apples and tractor wheels have been taken off and put aside for this part.)

Make sure your elastic loop is facing in against the printed pages and only the edges of it are at the seam.

Pin in place.

Starting at the bottom middle sew around the outside of the two pages, about a ⅜ inch from the edge, leave about a four inch gap in the bottom of the book from where you began your sewing to where you end it.

Step Twenty-One:

Clip off the extra fabric in the corners of your book (This will allow it to lay more flat when you flip the book).

Step Twenty-Three: Using the four inch gap you left in step twenty-one flip the page, so that the print side is out, taking special care to press out the corners of the page as much as possible.

Step Twenty-Two:

Iron your page. Fold up the edges of your four inch gap, and pin them in place. Then sew around the outside of your book (about ¼ inch from the edge) Start and end your sewing in the same place so that your four inch gap is sealed shut.

Step Twenty-Three:

Repeat steps these steps for your other two book pages. If your horse’s mane or tail hair is longer than the page make sure you tuck it up into the book before you sew around your page so it doesn’t get sewn into the seam.

Step Twenty-Four:

Line up the two sewn rectangular pages (that create the whole of your quiet book) and pin them in place so they completely overlap one another. Sew a straight line down the middle of your overlapped pages, creating the binding and securing the pages of the book together.

Step Twenty-Five:

Add all of your quiet book pieces to the book and congratulations, you are done! 🙂

Thank you so much for your purchase of this quiet book kit, if you found any of these instructions to be unclear or difficult please email me at [email protected] I’d love to get them updated and clarified to the best of my ability.

Spot cleaning with a light detergent and a damp rag is the best way to clean your quiet book, but it should also hold up if you remove all the excess pieces from it and wash it in the washing machine on a gentle cycle. Air dry only.

Please let me know if you have any comments or additional questions.

Click here to purchase this fabric through Spoonflower   (I recommend the cotton canvas fabric for the best durability)

Anticipated Crafting Time for this project: 4-5 Hours
This busy book is recommended for children ages 3-5.

Warning – This book contains small parts that may present a choking hazard for children under the age of 3.

The “My Bug Book” includes instructions to make the following pages:
• A front cover for the book
• A “Build The Bee Puzzle” page, with a 4 piece Velcro bee puzzle.
• A “Button The Ant Together” page, with two button on circles.
• A caterpillar page, with a peek-a-boo leaf, a free form caterpillar, and a pocket cocoon with a hook and eyelet.
• An “Add Wings To The Butterfly” page, with Velcro strips and 12 possible Velcro on wing designs to add and move around.
• A “Snap On The Ladybug Spots” page, with four snap on black spots.
• A “Help Weave The Spider Web” page, with a beaded spider, nine buttons, and a long length of string that can be woven around the buttons. (Supervise young children with the long string)
• A back book cover with a pocket for holding excess pieces when the book is not in use.

You will need the following supplies:
• Printed fabric for the pages and pieces (Available for purchase through Spoonflower – I would recommend the cotton canvas fabric for the best durability)
• Iron on fixative lining (to reinforce the smaller pieces)
• Felt (to reinforce the smaller pieces)
• Cording
• Elastic
• Velcro
• 2 Black or Brown Beads (One smaller one larger for the spider body)
• 9 Small Buttons (for the spiders web)
• 2 Large Black Buttons (for the button on ant)
• 4 Sewable Snap
• A Hook and Eyelet Pair

• A Sewing Machine (Can also be hand sewn)
• A Needle
• Thread
• Sewing Pins
• Scissors
• An Iron
• An Ironing Board or Ironing Surface

• Note – A few minor design updates may have been made to the fabric & movable pieces for better usability.

Step One:

Iron the printed fabric. Then take the fabric and cut out the 4 large rectangular pages of the book, each section should have two pages still attached in the middle, and when they are cut out they should look like the image to the right.

Put pages aside.

Step Two:

Take the leftover fabric with the various smaller pieces for the quiet book and make sure you DO NOT CUT OUT the individual pieces.

Take the smaller pieces, your fixative lining and your felt and follow the fixative instructions to glue the pieces to the felt for added stability.

Start by taking the fabric with the smaller quiet book pieces and cut the iron on fixative lining and the felt to match the size and shape of the fabric.

Next layer them with the felt on the bottom, the iron on fixative in the middle, and the fabric on top (with the printed side facing away from the fixative). You may want a disposable cloth, or bit a excess fabric for this part as any overhang of the iron on fixative will be sticky and will gunk up your iron or ironing board if they touch.

Set your iron to a medium setting and press it to the printed fabric holding it for three seconds before removing it and pressing the next section. Continue until the whole cloth has been ironed. Then flip your cloth over so the print side is down, and repeat the process. (again you may want to use a cloth on this part to save your fabric and your iron if you have any overhang).

Step Three:

Take the fabric with the various quiet book pieces to your sewing machine and sew around each individual piece, keeping your thread just barely inside the line of the design.

Step Four:

After sewing around each of the butterfly wings and pieces for the “Bee Puzzle” take a piece of velcro and cut strips of it sized for each of the pieces. Sew the rough part of the velcro to the back of each butterfly wing and “bee” piece.

Step Five:

Find the Quiet Book page titled “Build The Bee Puzzle” and sew the soft part of the velcro to the middle of each wing, and a long strip from the bee’s head down its body like shown in the image above.

Step Six:

Find the Quiet Book page titled “Add Wings To The Butterfly” and sew a strip of the soft side of the velcro to each side of the butterfly’s body like in the image shown below.

Step Seven:

Separate your snaps, and hand sew one side of the backing on each of the four, small and matching in size, black circles (Ladybug Spots). (Note: Make sure you sew the correct or snappable side of the snap facing out – test with the other half of the snap to see if they fit together if you are unsure which side is correct).

Step Eight:

Take the page with the title “Snap On The Ladybug Spots”. Hand sew the other side of the snaps used in step seven to the red part of the ladybug’s body. (Note: Make sure you sew the correct or snappable side of the snap facing out – test with the other half of the snap to see if they fit together if you are unsure which side is correct)

Step Nine:

Step Ten:

Step Eleven:

Step Twelve:

Find the page titled “Help Weave The Spider’s Web”. Take your nine small buttons and lay them out over the page in a circle type pattern, and hand sew them into place. I suggest making a small triangle in the middle with three buttons and then sewing the other six around the triangle in a bigger circle like in the image to the right. I would also suggest having each of your buttons sewn ¾ of an inch to 1 ½ inches apart. Make sure you leave a 1 ½ inch margin from the top, right, and left of the page so the buttons don’t get sewn when attaching the pages together.

Step Thirteen:

Take a long string and starting from the back of the spider page knot it into place. Then using a needle thread the long piece through one of the buttonholes.

Next, thread the larger of your two spider beads onto the thread followed by the smaller of the two beads. Then loop the thread back through just the bottom/larger bead. Knot your thread (I suggest multiple times) under the large black bead so that the two beads are at the far end of the string. Cut off any excess hanging thread.

Step Fourteen:

Take the large green leaf cutout and match it up with the large green leaf on the caterpillar page. Sew the leaf into place by sewing a short line across the top of the leaf (where it might connect to a branch) creating a leaf “flap”.

Step Fifteen:

Take your hook and eyelet pieces and the brown “extra fabric” that will make up your cocoon.

Sew the hook on the narrow end of the cocoon piece, on the felt side (not printed side) with the hook part facing away from the rest of the cocoon.

Next fold your cocoon so that the two melon shaped sides of it overlap. Then fold the narrow piece you just sewed the hook onto over the other half of the folded cocoon. Note where your hook aligns on the top of the cocoon. Where it aligns sew the eyelet piece with the large, round circle part facing toward the hook like pictured to the right.

Step Sixteen:

Take the brown cocoon and again fold it so that the melon shaped sides overlap. While folded, pin it to the large green leaf of the page opposite the butterfly, and, starting at the pointed top part of the melon shape, sew around the cocoon from top point to bottom point only on the side without the flap. This should create a pocket to hold the caterpillar.

Step Seventeen:

Find the two green rectangles of fabric (meant for a pocket on the back of the book). Take the green cover of the book and find the light outline of where the pocket should be. Line up the pocket pieces over the outline so you can see how the top and bottom part of the pocket will overlap. Take a square of Velcro and sew one part of it to the inside flap of the top pocket rectangle and sew the other part to the outside part of the bottom pocket rectangle so they can attach together when sewn onto the back cover.

Then line up the larger of the pocket rectangles with the bottom outline on the cover page. Sew around the left, bottom, and right side of it. Afterward take the smaller of the rectangles (the lid) and line it up with the outline, pin in place, and sew only across the top of this piece. This should allow it to flap over the pocket and prevent any extra pieces from sliding out while still allowing easy access to the content inside.

Step Eighteen: (Optional)

Take the front cover of the book and sew a button onto the far right side of the page in the middle.

On the opposite side of the page pin the small loop of elastic, with the loop facing the print on the page, and the edges of the elastic pinned at the edge of the page.

Step Nineteen:

Take the front cover of the book, and lay it face up, then take the page with the bee puzzle and the ant and lay it face down over the top page, so the printed side of each page is touching. (Make sure all the extra pieces have been removed.)

Pin in place. Starting at the bottom middle sew around the outside of the two pages, about a ⅜ inch from the edge, leave about a four inch gap in the bottom of the book from where you began your sewing to where you end it.

Also make sure your elastic loop is facing in against the printed pages and only the edges of it are at the seam.

Step Twenty:

Clip off the extra fabric in the corners of your book (This will allow it to lay more flat when you flip the book).

Step Twenty-One:

Use the four inch gap you left in step nineteen and flip the page, so that the print side is out, taking special care to press out the corners of the page as much as possible.

Iron your page flat. (Avoid ironing over the velcro as it will melt)

Step Twenty-Two:

Fold up the edges of your four inch gap, and pin them in place. Then sew around the outside of your book page (about ¼ inch from the edge) Start and end your sewing in the same place so that your four inch gap is sealed shut.

Step Twenty-Three:

Repeat steps Nineteen through Twenty-Two for the other two pages of your quiet book.

Make sure all of the string for the spider’s web is tucked into the book so it doesn’t get sewn into the pages as you attach them.

Step Twenty-Four:

Line up the two sewn rectangular pages (that create the whole of your quiet book) and pin them in place so they completely overlap one another. Sew a straight line down the middle of your overlapped pages, securing the pages of the book together like binding.

Step Twenty-Five:

Add all of your Busy Book pieces to the book, sliding any excess butterfly wings into the pocket on the back and congratulations, you are done! 🙂

Thank you so much for your purchase of this busy book fabric, if you found any of these instructions to be unclear or difficult please email me at [email protected] I’d love to get them updated and clarified to the best of my ability.

Spot cleaning with a light detergent and a damp rag is the best way to clean your quiet book, but it should also hold up if you remove all the excess pieces from it and wash it in the washing machine on a gentle cycle. Air dry only.

Please let me know if you have any comments or additional questions.