Amber's Birthday Gift Part 2

So I didn't post yesterday. I don't know that anybody noticed or anything, but I did. Because I'm supposed to post on Thursday, but between rushing to get this finished in the morning and then just sort of relaxing and doing pretty much nothing in the afternoon, it didn't happen. I even have a post written that just needed to be published, but oh well. This is still my blog and so I can do what I want on it. Probably the biggest thing is me anyway. I determined to do this on Thursdays and I missed a Thursday.  We won't go into any psychoanalysis now. There's not time.

Okay, so for the second part of Amber's birthday gift, I made her a quiet book. I should probably say, "am still making" her a quiet book. The book got smaller and smaller as we went along. A word of caution here: if you ever decide to make a quiet book (this is my second try at one), start before the deadline. I got started about 2-3 weeks ago. Let's just say these things take a LONG time.  Thanks to my mom coming and helping me on Tuesday, there are this many pages, otherwise.......

But on the other hand, it was quite fun. But I also know why people charge 80-100 dollars for one. The expense is minimal, but the time, OH THE TIME!! But it was still fun. And hey, while I'm making one, why not make two? I mean there are birthdays coming up and things and who knows who would like a quiet book? Actually, I don't know if she will like it or not, but I do know who is getting the second quiet book. And I do hope she likes it. 

There are no front pages or cover pages of the book YET.  Someday there will be. That will probably be the next set of pages that I do. So, I'm going to describe what I did here a bit. You don't have to read this, this is more for my info later if I want to repeat the page.  Flowers that are buttoned onto the page. Two layers of felt blanket-stitched together. I got carrried away on blanket stitching. The stems are just embroidery floss of various shades of green.

 Shapes. I'm not sure why the page is laying on its side, but maybe I turned the camera. I'm not sure. I only took a picture of one page here because both were identical. I stitched the shape to the background and then ironed on a piece of fabric to another piece of felt and stitched it together. Velcro is what holds the matches together.

 I love this page. I think it's just so cute. A little bear with a cotton filling tucked inside a little quilt that has a cotton batting and back and is knotted with embroidery floss.  You tuck the bear in and out of the quilt.

 This is fairly self-explanatory, but oh so very time consuming. 1.5 inch squares sewed and turned inside out and then top stitched. The flannel and thicker pieces were blanket stitched together beings I didn't think I would be able to turn them inside out. First I sewed velcro onto one side of all of these so you can velcro them on to the appropriate color. I should have taken a few off of the picture so you can see.  And yes, I sewed the one page together upside down so that is why the word "Colors" is at the bottom of the page.  And yes there is a mostly green one on the yellow spot. I thought I had captured mostly yellow when I cut it out, but apparently not.

 Dressing the doll. There are four dresses that you can turn around and have four more designs. They are very simple, just cotton ironed together and then cut out. I'm hoping they will hold up. Then there are two sets of pajamas again reversible made out of flannel. There is one pair of odd shoes that I'm guessing will be lost within the first two weeks. These are all tucked into the wardrobe with the zipper. The bow is to hide the stitching that holds the hair on.

 And a barn with finger puppets. The barn needs more things, like a sun and clouds, but by this time I was done, tired, finished. Maybe later.

 A weaving page.

A mitten to stick your hand into.  And yes, I forgot the eyebrows on the one, but I almost like him as good without, so there.

So I  know most of this stuff is too big for Amber at this point as far as intelligently making choices, but I hope she will have fun with it and will grow with it as well.  She's already experimented with a few pages in order to keep her happy so I could work on the others.

I have a few other pages I want to add either to this book or as a bigger book or even as a felt board. Pages like trees with different colored leaves, the alphabet, a number pages with different buttons and brads, a cupcake baking page, matching socks, tic tac toe, memory game. I also saw a cool Tetris style game that I thought would be fun too.  So many ideas, so little time to orchestrate it all.  I think I want to try and make one page a month. I might make a couple of the same page. They really would make a nice gift for someone very special or I might try to sell them as individual pages so they cost less than $80 and people could pick just the pages they want. All these ideas swirling around in my head.

And yes, then maybe if I could sell a few I could replace my ironing board cover. Maybe none of you noticed all the stains on it, I tried to make sure the holes in it were not visible on the pictures. But don't judge me by my ironing board cover. That thing endures a lot of heat!!

In other news, D is coming home tonight after being gone ALL WEEK!!! I'm very excited.  The week really didn't go that bad, but I am very ready for him to be home for the weekend again.

Coming up next week, Lord willing: my one year old and her birthday pics.