Quiet Books

I was recently introduced to the concept of Quiet Books...little fabric/felt books for your little kid.  The most amazing Quiet Book maker seems to be Stephanie from Imagine Our Life.  She's seriously crafty with the felt and all of the books are so interactive.  Love!  

I mentioned this to my mom and she sent me a bunch of sheets of 9x12 fancy felt from the craft store.

Fun!  I just need to find the time to create some of these.  I like that Imagine Our Life has all of the directions on how to make the pages into a full book, because I have a hard time conceptualizing dimensions and sizes.

I really want to make a pirate-themed quiet book, with a shooting cannon, One-Eyed Willie, treasure chest, treasure map, pirate parrot, and a peg leg.  I have a lot of ideas for it floating around in my head.  Again...just need the time.  But in the meantime, check out these pirate quiet book pages:  Imagine Our Life (love the rolling map and the treasure chest), another version of the same by More Holiness Give Me (I like the contents of her map), and a pattern for sale.

Recreate Art: Choices

Back in June I mentioned that I would be recreating some art, specifically this piece:

I also mentioned that I wanted to buy the cotton for this quilting project from a local store.  Well, in the three or so months since I posted about this project, I have not made it to a quilting store.  Blah.  So I've decided to buy the fabric online.

Here are the fabrics that I've chosen that will (hopefully) match:

What do you think?  Too dark?  I don't know.  It doesn't have to be exact, only close.  Anyway, I chose these fabrics from Purl Soho and these are the names of the colors:

Now I have to figure out how much to buy of each.  Quarter yard each?  I haven't even considered the backing fabric or the seam binding.  Maybe I should get extra of the pool fabric and do backing and binding in that color.  I'm also considering doing those print-yo-self labels for the back so that I can put my name and date on it.

Another package...

My mom has been on a rampage with the packages lately.  Her most recent package was filled with tons of little Halloween trinkets for Halloween trick-or-treaters.  Our neighborhood got like 200 kids last year and the year before (I think they are shipped in from elsewhere in the city, I swear, because there are not that many kids around here...or maybe there are and they just hide when they see me coming), so I can make up some little gift bags with a toy and a trinket.  Will keep you posted on how that goes.

Otherwise, it was another box of fabric, featuring polyester fabric:

 There's about a yard of that and am I the only one who thinks of Where in the World is Carmen San Diego when you hear the word "polyester?"  It's because one of the characters was called Polly Esther Fabrique.  Love that.  Actually, I wanted to work it into a blog name, but nothing ever came of it.

On with the fabrics...she sent me a bunch of little scraps, which is actually good, because I've been thinking about an I Spy quilt and scrap quilts, so maybe some of these fabrics could be worked into those projects.

 And then she sent me two more pieces of chintz.  Not really sure if I like these at all.  The white one is definitely vintage.  We'll see.  I could wash them first.

As for the rest of the box, there was some interfacing, another craft book, and some felt.

Thanks, Mom!

I Spy Fabric Has Arrived

As mentioned here, I joined an I Spy swap hosted by Crafterhours.  My fabric from Spoonflower showed up in the mail this week.

It looks sort of pink-ish in this photo, but it's really more of a purple.  Here's the link to the fabric.

Now I have to chop it up into 56 5"x5" squares.  Still no word on whether or not I have to wash it first.

Formerly In Bloom: Hyacinth Bean Vine

Thrifty Three

I found three separate yards of fabric at the Goodwill recently.

 Hmmm...that picture doesn't do the fabric on the left any justice.  It's pretty sparkly and transparent...

Ah, that's better.

But as with most fabrics lately, I just added it to the top of the pile for sorting.

If I had more hangers, then I would add it to my fabric closet, but I'm out of those.

Another Craft "Book"

I owe you a post, don't I?  From that last package that my mom sent, right?  So the final craft-related item in that box was this book:

 Awesome!  I've been looking up ways to use my scraps.  A few months ago I organized them by color into those plastic zip bags that sheet sets come in.  Here are some of my favorite projects from this book.

Scrappy quilt...

 Weird monsters...

 Various kid toys...

 And then the vagina bouquet pillow...

What?  It's not a vagina bouquet pillow?  But the pattern looks sort of like a swollen vagina, doesn't it?

I mean, isn't "oval flower" a sort of euphemism for vagina?