Animal Heads

 I love this page.  This was the first hard page that I did and part way through I started to wonder what did I get myself into.  It really wasn't that hard but I got worried about how it would turn out because I had such high hopes.  Well is was all for not because it turned out way cute I think and I've played with it with my sunbeams and they loved it.  I found a lot of different animal patterns while looking and I couldn't make up my mind while planning so I prepped both.  I decided to go with the one that had the most animals.  I chose this because I love the whale and the snake and the dinosaur and all the variety.  I thought all that variety would be the most fun to switch around.  But it was a lot of work and they ended up being pretty small.  I explained all this to my friend when she was starting this page and she decided to do the set with fewer animals.  I love the way hers turned out and she loves the way mine turned out.  The grass will always be greener...  The choice is yours.

1. Trace the bodies on to the pages.
2. Color the bodies keeping in mind the animals, it's easy to get mixed up without the heads.
3. Sew the velcro in the middle of the dotted lined circles.
4.  Trace the animal heads onto the spare fabric.
5. Color the heads.
6. Cut heads out
7. Pin the heads to another piece of the spare fabric and cut out another head.
8. Sew the other half of the velcro onto the back of the uncolored animal head.
9. Next you need to attach the two head pieces.  I sewed mine together with black thread keeping the stitches on top of the tracing around the head.  My friends used wonder under to attach them.  I think the wonder under is faster and easier.  It's up to you.
10. Lastly, put some words down.  I chose a simple "Mix 'n' Match" on both pages.

 

 

 

 

 

Flowers

This is another one that was in my childhood book.  Which also means that it is one of my favorites.  It is super easy to do so have fun with it.

1. Trace the above page on your fabric page.  I used colorful sharpies for the stems and flowers.  I would suggest tracing the vase on a little smaller then the one shown.  You'll need to know where to place the felt but you don't want it to show from behind.
2. Make a stencil of the flowers and the vase.
3. Cut two flowers of each of the five colors of felt.  Although you wont be using velcro you still need to add thickness.
4. Sew the two pieces of flowers together.
5. Make a button hole.  Most machines have this feature.  If you don't know how to use it take your machine to a sewing machine repair shop or ask a friend that sews so they can teach you how.  It is a great thing to know how to do and believe it or not, you will be able to do so many other sewing projects after learning how.
6. Hand sew the shank buttons onto the page where the small circles are inside the flowers.
7. Sew on the vase.  I did a tight zig zag stitch to apply but you can do a simple strait stitch close to the edge as well.
8. Trace the words on the page.  This is my Mother's day page so I wrote, "Roses are Red, Violets are Blue.  Flowers for Mom means I love you." 

Football

This is one that my mother had made and put in my family's book.  I loved it when I was young and I just know my kids are going to love it, that is when their old enough to play with it.

1.  Trace the pattern on a paper, don't forget to cut out or hole punch the holes.
2. Cut out of fabric.  I went to the Home Decor fabric section of JoAnn to get some brown fabric that looked like real football hide.  I waited till it was 50% off.  I think the fabric was originally $35 a yard but with the discount and then the fact that I could get the least amount that I could get which was 5".  I only paid $2.43 for the 5" strip that I have been able to share with my friends that I am making it with and we will even be splitting that price.
3. Put eyelets in the holes.  
4. Sew the football on the page.
5. Lace the football up with a shoe lace.
6. Trace the words on.  You don't have to use the words that I did, but if you want it's, "Can you tie the football to play catch with Dad?"  I'm trying to do a page for each holiday and this is my Father's day page.  Enjoy!

The Six Bees

 The Six Bees came from a talk by Gordon B. Hinkley back in 2001.  I got to go to the Conference Center when he gave this talk.  This message is very special to me and I believe it strongly.  I knew that I had to include it in my quiet book because I really want my children to learn it and know that it is true like I do.

1. Trace the beehive and the words on the page felt. (I waited to the end to do the dotted lines around the bees.)
2. Color the beehive.
3. Trace the bees on spare felt.  Make sure to leave about half of an inch between each of the bee's.
4. Color the bees.
5. Place the bees over another piece of spare felt.  Put a pin through each of the bees so they are each connected.  Then cute through both layers leaving a little boarder around the bees.
6. Sew snaps onto the back layer of the bees.
7. Sew the other half of the snaps onto the page felt (You can use velcro if you want but I wanted to have a bunch of different forms of connecting the pieces as I could to teach the children how to do them all).
8. Sew the front on the bee to the back of the bee with the snap side out (may also use wonder under instead of sewing).
9. Place the bees on the snaps and outline the bees with a dotted line.

Winter Snowman

This is such a fun page to make and I can tell you from personal experience, so fun to play with.  I had this page when I was a growing up to play with at church.  Instead of a snowman we had a bird.  I changed it because I thought it made more sense. You will need some extra Ribbon for this project.  The crazier or the uglier the better.

1. The first two pages above need to be traced on the pages.
2. Color them with crayons. (My sister gave me the idea to sew fabric on the sides of Snowman instead of drawing the scarf.  I wish I would have done this with some fleece or something.  I'll leave that up to you all.)
3. With the third page above of the hats trace them with tracing paper.  You only need to outline them.
4. Cut these tracings out and pin the hats to different colors of felt. Cut two of each of the hats.  One of the layers will need the velcro on the back.
5. You can decorate the top layer with ribbon, fabric, or makers.  Make each one different and unique.
6. Sew the a square of velcro on the back of the back layer. Use the teeth side of the velcro on the hats.
7. Sew the two layers together making sure not to sew the velcro inside the two layers.
8. Sew the other sides of the velcro on the ends of the coat rack.
9. Cut a piece of velcro about an inch long.  
10. Sew the soft side of the velcro on the top of the snowman head.

You should be DONE at this point!

Word of Wisdom

 This spread is a lot of fun to do and looks so cute when complete.  I got this pattern from a friend who got it from Finch Family Games file folders.  Here is their site if you would like to look at it:
http://www.finchfamilygames.com/ We just changed it from paper to felt but the concept is still the same.  Here's how we start.

 1.  Trace the "Yum" page and the "Yuck" page on your felt pages.  It is a good idea to draw the outline of the food either with a thin line or with dotted lines.  DO NOT draw the food on the page it self. 
2.  Color the words, plate, utensils and garbage as desired.  Cut zelcro into squares. 
3.  Sew either the teeth (which I recommend) or the soft side in the center of each of the blank spots where the food is eventually going to go.

 4.  Next trace all the food items onto your spare felt.
 5.  Color each of these with crayon.
 6.  Cut each piece out. I used a regular sized black Sharpie to outline each of the items and then traced the inside with a fine tip black Sharpie.  Because I did my outline thicker I was able to cut the items on the edge of the line and not leave any white.  I think it looks better this way with this particular page but this wont always be the case with other pages.
 7.  Once they are all cut out trace the outline of the food items onto another piece of spare felt.
8.  Cut these outlines out. 
9.  Sew the other half of the velcro onto the piece you just cut out.  You will have two layers to all the pieces, top layer is colored the back layer has the velcro.  Pay special attention to the side of the back piece you put the velcro on.  This might sound confusing so if it does please email me and I can try to clarify better.
10.  Once the velcro is all attached to the back side pieces you can either sew or use Wonder Under to attach these two pieces.  If sewing I would advise to use black thread and sew on top of the thick black boarder.  If using Wonder Under then us a cloth in between your iron and the food piece, you will either melt the crayon onto the iron or melt the velro.

It is very important not to do step 10 before step 9.  

If you do then the stitching of the velcro will go through both layers and show on the top of the food item.
You should be done at this point and can now apply the food items to the page.

 Here's some close ups for you.