Vintage Market Quiet Book

Hi there! I am really excited about this project! Cherise is here to share this adorable Quiet Book with us! She will be here for the next several weeks sharing the details of each page in the Quiet Book!

I love quiet books, and I can tell you from experience that they are so fun to make! Cherise has done such a lovely job with this quiet book, you will want to start your own right away! :) So we hope you will follow along each week and if you decide you want to make one too - please use the hashtag #sewingwithfwfabricstudio on Instagram so we can see!

A Vintage Market Quiet Book

 I'm so excited to be on Fort Worth Fabric Studio's blog today talking about my newest project- a Quiet Book with the cutest fabric from Tasha Noel's newest line of fabric- Vintage Market!

I was so excited when Fort Worth Fabric Studio (FWFS) asked me to do a project and blog about it because I’ve always wanted to have an opportunity to do something like this! This is my first project for a blog and I’m happy that it’s for FWFS. I’ve spent lots of dollars there shopping for the latest and greatest fabrics and notions; and I have to say that their shipping rates to Canada are the best which is probably why I order so much fabric from them (much to the dismay of my husband! :)

 

When they asked me to do a project I did some hard thinking and decided that a Quiet Book for my youngest daughter was just the project. A few years ago I did a quiet book for my older daughter and she loved it so I knew that my younger daughter would love one too. I knew immediately what fabric I wanted for it! Vintage Market by Tasha Noel is so cute and perfect because I could play off the designs that are already in the fabric to come up with a uniquely cute quiet book.  This line of fabric is everything wholesome and sweet, exactly what I hope my daughters grow up to be one day!

Today I'm going to show you how to plan to make this quiet book and then we're going to get started on our first page!

Supplies needed:

• Fabric ( 1 yard for the pages if you are fussy cutting your designs, ½ yard of fabric and 4 Fat quarters for different designs)
• Felt of varying colors
•   Fusible web  (I used Heat n Bond lite)
• Fusible fleece or quilt batting
• Buttons
• Snaps
• Sew in Velcro
• 1 -8” zipper
• Ribbon
• Beads (5)
• Thread of varying colors
• Rotary cutter and scissors
• Heavy weight fusible interfacing
• Pencil and paper
• 1 Jean needle (optional)
•   Green ric rac (optional)
•   Tear away embroidery stabilizer (optional)

Step 1: Planning your quiet book

The first thing to do is plan how many pages you want in your quiet book and how big your pages are going to be. When the book was finished I knew I wanted the pages to measure 8” L by 8 1/4” W each and have 6 pages plus a front and back cover. Why the extra ¼” in the width? When you join the pages together in the middle to make the ‘spine’ of the book it helps to have that extra ¼” space. Draw a diagram of how many pages you want and include measurements that include your seam allowance of ¼ “. My diagram is as follows:

Each page measures 8 ½ L” by 8 ¾” W. You can see that two pages when they are sewn together using a ¼” seam allowance down one side will make a rectangle 8 ½ “Lx 17” W.  

You can see in this picture that I’ve labeled my pages and where they are to go- this is IMPORTANT! You have to label the pages in the SAME order as in the picture for the pages to come together properly!  You can see that Pages 1 and 6 (sewn together) are going to go back to back with the Front and Back cover pages (sewn together) and that pages 3 & 4 (sewn together) are going back to back with pages 5 & 2 (sewn together). Once those pages are sewn back to back you will have two units which we will sew together to make the quiet book- I hope you can makes sense! I think you’ll get a better idea of this as well go along. I’ve labeled each page with what design I wanted to do on that page.

Step 2: Making Page 1 of your quiet book- Button Flowers Page

For the first page I knew I wanted to do a 'Flowers with Buttons' page where kids practice doing and undoing buttons. I wanted to incorporate the cute ‘Flowers ‘stand on the fabric so I fussy cute the ‘Flowers’ stand off to the left side of the page over far enough that I could put the button flowers beside it.

Cut your fabric 8 ½” Lx 8 3/4” W, fussy cutting the ‘Flowers’ Stand off the left side.

Draw a template of your flowers and a vase on a piece of paper and cut them out. Place them on your page and arrange as you like.

Take your templates and take 3 colors of felt and trace around your templates on the felt. The color of felt doesn’t matter too much because we are going to cover them  with fabric to show case the fabrics. Trace 2 pieces of felt for each flower.

Now take your fusible web and trace the shape of each flower onto the fusible web.

Cut out the flower and iron the fusible web flower shape on the backside of the fabric you will use for each flower. Cut out the flower shape of fabric for each flower.

Now take one piece of felt for each flower and the corresponding fabric/fusible web flower  and iron the fabric/fusible web flower onto your piece of felt. Line up the remaining pieces of felt flowers with the corresponding fabric/felt flower and sew the two pieces together. Do this for each flower. You should have three flowers done at the end.  I used two pieces of felt for each flower because it makes the flower thicker and easier for little hands to grab on to. In the pictures you can see the back side of one felt flower and the front side with the fabric. I also ended up hand sewing my flower units together because that was easiest for me but you can use your sewing machine as well.

Now pick what buttons you want to use the center of each flower.  Then take your button, put it in the center of your fabric/felt flower, and make a mark on either side of your button and then draw a line down the middle connecting your marks. This marks your button hole.  After you’ve marked your button holes on all three flowers then use your sewing machine to sew a button hole on each flower unit.

Use your seam ripper to rip open the button hole area so the button can fit through.

Take the template of your vase and trace it onto your fusible web, cut it out and iron it onto the backside of your fabric for the vase. Cut the vase out.

Take your flower pieces and your vase and arrange onto your page as you like, keeping away from the ¼” seam allowance on all sides of your page where you will be sewing. Once you have it arranged how you like use an air/water erasable marker to trace around your flowers and vase so you know where they will go on your page and mark the center of the button hole so you know where to sew your button later on.

Cut your pieces of ric rac for the flower stems as long as the length from your button hole mark to just under the top of where you traced your vase. Sew the ric rac in place. You don’t have to use ric rac; you can use ribbons or embroider stems too.

Now take your vase and place it where you had traced for it to go, making sure that the top of your vase just covers the bottom of your ric rac. Remove the fusible web backing and iron in place. Then applique around the sides of the vase. When I applique I like to use a tear away stabilizer on the back which helps reduce fabric bunching when appliqueing (this is optional).

Put aside your page for now, do NOT sew your buttons in yet. Place your flowers with the page  in a place where you won’t lose them. Yay! You’re done your first page!

Whew, I feel that that was a long post but I hope that you're all still with me and starting to see the method-to-my-madness in sewing this book so far! As you see it come together it'll just get more exciting! The next posts will hopefully not be as long- next time I'll explain about sewing Page 2- Balloons!

Enjoy!

Cherise