Quiet Book Closure...LITERALLY!!

Hi there! I'm feeling rather satisfied right now. I have done what I have been meaning to do for a whole year. It's a little rough. It's far from perfect. But it is DONE! My daughter's Quiet Book cover. Completed in time for Christmas 2012. Huzzah!

On Finishing Things I Start

Finishing what I start. Something I am not always very good at. Take the tea challenge, for example. I have been keeping up with drinking my different tea each day. I have not had many coffee cravings, and have not given in to the few I have had. However, I have been lax in writing it all down. Oh dear. It has all become a blur of lovely moments of quiet in my mind. I can tell you the teas I have been drinking - just not the order I drank them in. I have had:

• Turkish Apple
• Russian Caravan
• English Breakfast
• Earl Grey
• Marco Polo
• Rose with French Vanilla
• Jasmine Green Tea with Pear
• Chocolate Mint Rooibos
• Cranberry and Pomegranate
• Chamomile, Vanilla and Honey
• Apple and Cinnamon
• Acai Berry Rooibos
• Lemon and Ginger

And I enjoyed every moment of each cup of tea. :) In fact, I have rather developed a habit of enjoying several different types of tea each day. 

Another example of not finishing what I start is the Quiet Book I was making for Eliza. I started it last December, and jokingly said I just might be finished by Eliza's birthday. It has been complete except for the cover for many months now. Today marks one month until Eliza's third birthday, and it strikes me that I must complete it in time for her birthday. Whenever she sees it perched on my sewing desk shelf, she wants to play with it. At least that is a good sign that she likes it! So, my mission is to complete the cover in the next month. 

Right now I am feeling quite hopeful, as in the last few days, I have completed a few small projects that I started (by cutting out the pieces) back in March. Hurray! What a great feeling it is to finishing something I have started, that has been sitting on the shelf for months. I even pushed on and photographed them, and listed them in my Etsy shop.

While I bask in that lovely feeling of achievement and completion, I am setting some small goals for the evening...to get the Quiet Book cover design finalised, and cut out the pieces. I reckon I might be able to whip up this cover over the weekend.

Maybe.

Quiet Book - Part X

I know, I have been a bit lazy about the Quiet Book lately. I am so close, but just not quite there.

 Well, today I finally finished off the last page - it is not the final page position-wise, but the final page to create. I've actually had it ready for a while, minus the washcloth and toothbrush.

I have ordered the pages and clipped them together with bulldog clips - so exciting!! Eliza and I read the book after her nap today, and she loves it so much. I am pleased! 

Now I just need to bind the pages together and create the cover, and put it all together...I wonder how long all that will take me?

Quiet Book - Part IX

Yet another Quiet Book page completed...HURRAY!

I've actually had this one completed for a while, minus the little accessories, which I bought online and had sent to me...except that the package got lost in the mail, and took several weeks to return to the sender (Create-A-Doll), who happen to be in Wosolloongabba. I chose today of all days to go over and pick it up, and Brisbane traffic decided to show me what I'm missing by not venturing out at peak hour on a weekday (even though I was well after peak hour today, it was still crazy - something to do with trains not running today, I hear) . 

However, I now have in my hot little hands TINY LITTLE KNIVES AND FORKS AND SPOONS AND BOWLS AND PLATES! Please excuse the yelling, I am a tad bit excited.

I am slightly disappointed, as one of my little bread and butter plates has a chip in it (see the one on the left, there). I am going to get a replacement set.

So the table and chairs are just cut out of nice ribbed cardboard, and glued on to the page. The cutlery and crockery live in the little pockets (um, that's obvious from my little embroidered labels, sorry for insulting your intelligence!), and Eliza has to take them out and "set the table". The cardboard provides a stable base. Good for fine motor skills - mine too!! They are really teeny tiny, so it's a bit fiddly, but that will be good for her. 

Of course, my main concern is that the tiny bits will get lost, so this is an activity to be completed strictly under supervision. The whole book is intended to be used in a supervised setting though, so I'm okay with that. 

One other aspect I am a little regretful about is the little pockets - they were supposed to have cover flaps that attached with a snap clip...but I got a little carried away with the embroidery and forgot to leave room for the flaps to attach to the pockets. I am thinking I'll have to come up with another way to keep the little bits in there safe and sound, or else they will fall out inside the book and likely get lost! Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. You can just leave a comment below. Thanks :)

Quiet Book - Part VIII

 With only three days (including today) left of February, I am in a hurry to complete this Quiet Book project. This is the last page in the book, as in, it will go at the end of the book. I still have two other pages to complete, as well as the cover and binding it all together. It is going to be a rather thick book!

I remember having some threading/"sewing" activities when I was a kid - I LOVED them. Eliza is especially keen to do this one, because it is sewing like Mummy does. 

The butterfly is cut out of 100% wool felt, as it is stronger and a better quality felt. I just used an unused shoe lace left over from my crazy laces phase as the "thread" and "needle". Even though there is not much to this page, it took a rather long time, as I used blanket stitch to strengthen all of the holes (which were just punched out with a hole punch), as well as the outside edge. The butterfly is just attached to the page via the green machine stitching, the wings are free-floating.

I had chosen some tiny blue buttons for eyes, but now I'm not sure whether or not to add them...any thoughts?

Quiet Book - Part VII

 The next page in the Quiet Book.

It's tricky making a 3D object like a backpack look good in sort of 2D, especially with zippers and such. I did my usual trick and did a google image search for some clip art of backpacks. I used one of those inspiration pictures for the craft I did with Miss E the other day.

The vinyl hat, sunscreen and lunch bag are totally wrong size in proportion to the backpack, but there was not much room left on the page! I put the backpack and these smaller objects to the "Eliza test" - I ask her, "What is it, Eliza?" and if she can tell me what it is, I know the shape is workable. She obviously can't read, but the lunch box and sunscreen are both shaped similarly to her own real versions of these, and similar colours. Anyway, they passed the test, so they are good to go!

The backpack is made of 100% wool felt, and has three pockets that Eliza can put her hat, sunscreen and lunch bag into. I was going to do trickier closures for the front pocket, but decided it would be too hard for her to actually do. So now she just has to slip the straps through the D-rings.

She has already had a go at the activity, and said "I want to do it again" after she finished - I guess that's a good sign, right? It is now a common thing for her to say "What you making, Mummy? Something for my special book?" Awww. Warms my heart :)

Quiet Book - Part VI

 As promised, another Quiet Book update. This time, a velcro task. Eliza needs to "make the bed" by pulling the "sheet", "blanket" and "doona" up in the correct order, and attaching them correctly, and attaching the "pillow" on top. I had fun making this one!

Seriously considering making a tiny bear to go in the bed as well...hmmm...maybe I'll delay that until after I've got the main pages all finished!

Quiet Book - Part V

Oooh, I had a little burst of progress on the Quiet Book on the weekend. Several more pages are almost complete now. I am past the half-way point and the end is in sight! How good that light looks at the end of the tunnel. I have had fun working on it, but it is always great to finish a project (I have too many unfinished ones sitting around here!).

Getting ahead of myself here. I have only actually COMPLETED one more page, so here it is:

As you know, I LOVE buttons. Don't you think those lovely bright coloured buttons look yummy all lined up like that? Of course, they are not edible. Which reminds me, I saw a pic on pinterest the other day of edible buttons. As in, confectionery that was cast in button molds. Wow! I just looked them up, and found they are for sale on Etsy here. Cute idea, huh.

Quiet Book - Part IV update

Thanks to Kirsty and Kathryn for your feedback about my last post. Here is the page I posted about last time with the snap clips sewn on.

Eliza tried this page out for me when I was done. She needs a little help, but she loved it! And that, after all, is why I'm bothering with this. *satisfied smile*

To see more of the Quiet Book, click here.

Quiet Book - Part IV

Happy Monday everyone. I hope you are all having a good day. I found out today that some items I had purchased online for one of the pages of the Quiet Book have somehow been lost in the mail. Here's hoping they show up sometime soon!

I have been working on another page in the meantime. This one features a larger version of the Silver Birch Tree that I have previously posted about.

Credit goes to my Mum for suggesting I make little birds for the tree, attached with snap clips, so Eliza can pull them off and clip them back on.

After watching my hubby and daughter's daily ritual of throwing bird seed out the front windows of our house for the pigeons, I was inspired to add some french knots and straight stitch bird seeds under the tree, with extra clips, so the birds can be taken down from the tree and put on the ground to eat the seed.

Credit to my hubby for the bird outline he drew for me. Thanks babe!

The clips are yet to be attached, and I'm thinking about french knot eyes for the birds...what do you think?

(Every time I work on this, I get a certain song stuck in my head..."Feed the birds, tuppence a bag..." Ha ha! Now it's stuck in your head too!)

Quiet Book - Part III

 Finally, an update on the quiet book. I have finally picked up where I left off, after a few weeks' break. I decided to do the pages in calico, and hand embroider the words just in my regular printing. It's definitely not perfect, but it is 'created with love' as the title page says.

I am rather happy with how the clothes turned out. In the end, I used tigertail threaded through tiny pegs with small couching stitches on either side of the pegs, attached at the ends through vintage buttons, and threaded back and forth through the calico page. It's a little crowded, the downside of making so many clothes! Seeing them all lined up on the A4 page like that gives you a better idea of the size of each item of clothing.

 Below left is the finished shoe-tying page, although I may need to re-thread the eyelets with something more stable than the novelty yarn that is currently acting as shoe laces. Below right is the almost-complete page that will be next to the shoe-tying page in the book. It is supposed to be the back of a head, if you can't tell (and you would most certainly be forgiven for not being able to guess!). It's a rather full head of hair, rather more full than Eliza's actual hair, but that was due to me having in my possession some half-finished craft projects passed down from my grandmother...I just gave this doll's hair (I think that is what it was going to be?) a trim. It is going to make the book rather fat.

To see the previous pages on the Quiet Book, you can go here.
Comments and suggestions are most welcome :)

Quiet Book - Part II B - More clothes!

And that's all I have to say today!

(For more on the quiet book, see previous posts, New Arrivals, Decorations and Gift Ideas, Quiet Book - Part I and Quiet Book - Part II )

Quiet Book - Part II

Clothes! Little tiny vintage-style clothes!! YIPPEE!!!

Ummm...can you tell that I am excited about this project??

 Okay, so the dress-up doll was always going to be on the first pages of this quiet book. But my initial (very bad) sketches have turned out to be quite different from the end product. I am ashamed to show them, but here are my initial sketches (sorry they are so faint).

The problem was, I just could not get inspired to create that in felt. After a quick Google search for 'felt dolls', I found this blog post, that referenced this Flickr photo by Olivia Mew, shown below. WOW! I wanted to do that, but with little girls' clothes!

I have always loved paper dolls and their cute little outfits, so I decided to draw inspiration from the paper doll concept. I did some research online and found this awesome site featuring the Betsy McCall doll from several decades of McCalls magazines. JUST WHAT I WAS LOOKING FOR!  I have used the shape of one of the Betsy McCall paper dolls and used the basic shapes of several of the dresses and other little outfits.


The dress on the bottom right is the inspiration for the teal dress shown at the top of the post. I have cut the outfits out of felt and then added detail in embroidery and embellished with beads, ribbons, and so on.

I am really, really, really, REALLY enjoying this phase of the quiet book project!! It brings out the little girl in me...probably a little too much. My husband suggested that I would enjoy playing with it as much as our daughter would, and that I would probably cry if our she loses or damages any of these little clothes - that's a bit too close to the truth for comfort! But I really want it to be something that she loves and gets use from for years to come.

We had a quiet book growing up, which my mother still has. We always loved it, and now my daughter and niece and nephew love to play with it when they visit Grandma. There is something special about handmade toys that are loved over generations. Maybe I am being too ambitious, but that is what I hope to create.

My hubby arrived home as I was working on this the other night...while simultaneously breastfeeding. He thought it was too funny and actually went to the trouble of locating the camera and snapping a pic to document the moment - this is rather out of character for him!

The process of making these little clothes is rather time-consuming, but OH-SO-FUN! It feels even more drawn out, as I start it, then get called away to help Miss E on the potty, then return to do a few more stitches, then have to tend to Mr T who is squawking for food and so on. So why not keep sewing while he feeds, hey?

Now my big dilemma is WHERE DO I STOP?? Ah, the age-old question - how many clothes does a girl need? Or probably, in this case, how can I force myself to stop making these adorable and addictive little bits of craftiness??

This particular girl's wardrobe currently contains the following completed items:

 And I already have another eleven items cut out and ready to sew...