Quiet {Flip} Book

This is a project I have been working on since June. It's taken me a while, but I am SO happy with how it turned out!! Better than I expected! I'm not sure what to call it yet - it's a quiet book because it's made of cloth, but it's a flip/body/mix & match book... So for now, it's a quiet {flip} book!

Want to see how I did it?

If not, then I'm not really sure what to tell you... {awkward...}

For those that do, here we go!!

I started by getting on the computer and drew/illustrated eight different "people". I divided the page into thirds - heads, arms & body, and legs. I printed out a template to use as a guide to cut the fabric. I also printed out all the people to trace & stitch later.

I bought some thin, white cotton fabric and cut the 3 different sizes 'tabs'. (I would tell you dimensions, but I am still figuring out the pattern.) Since there will be 8 complete 'pages', I needed to cut out a front and back piece for each tab. I ended up with a total of 48 tabs (16 top, 16 middle, 16 bottom). I also cut out one piece of Warm & Natural batting for each tab. Sounds confusing, but hopefully it will all make sense soon.

Next, I got out my handy light board and traced all of my people onto their respective tabs with a water erasable marking pen. I started with the head, then left the fabric there and then traced the body. Same with the legs, just to make sure they lined up & that I was tracing everything centered.

I whipped out my embroidery hoop, huge bag of thread in every color & found a comfy spot on the couch. Then I stitched. And stitched...and stitched some more. Almost every night. Thank goodness for DVR! :) For more instructions on tracing & stitching, see my Fairy Stitchery Tutorial here.

Rinse your stitcheries to get rid of the marker and lay flat to dry. Once they are dry I recommend ironing. That should take care of most wrinkles. Sometimes the wrinkles don't completely come out, even with steam. I did figure out that if you spray your pieces with water with a spray bottle (just enough to be damp), then press your iron on the wrinkled area, it makes a huge difference in getting most of the stubborn wrinkles out.

To finish the tabs, I placed the cotton fabric right sides together (though it didn't really seem to have a right or wrong side) and then sewed them together leaving the left side open to flip. Be sure to clip corners so they will be nice & pointy.

And no, you aren't seeing things. I did change my logo in the middle of this project. I was just too lazy to go back & update the previous photos... don't judge me.

I chose leaving the left side open because that will be the side in the binding.

I folded in the edge & sewed it up. I'm sure there's lots of better ways to do this, but this method works fine for me!

Here is the pile of all the finished tabs! I recommend ironing after this step, too.

You don't have to, but it makes the next step a little easier.

I love when it's time to get the crayons out & color away! It's so fun! Don't be afraid to mix colors like I did on the pants here. Especially if you want a specific color that you don't have with your crayons. I usually try to match the thread color as close as possible. Just be careful when using a dark color crayon next to a lighter thread so you don't accidentally color over it!

Next, it was time to make the covers! I laid out one set of the tabs & measured the length & width, then added about an inch on each side. I had some leftover purple sparkly fabric from my Christmas stockings that I thought would be perfect for this project! I put a layer of batting in between two pieces of fabric for each cover. Then sewed right sides together leaving about a 3 inch gap, then flipped and sewed the hole closed.

With the help of my fantastic helper of a husband, we marked with the water erasable pen where the holes needed to be to bind the pages together. Then I just poked through the dots with a seam ripper, making a hole big enough for the rings to fit through.

After much searching, I finally found some SETS of eyelets in the right size. I found plenty of the one-sided ones. I wanted both front & back to look nice and didn't want the fabric to snag on anything if I had used the one-sided eyelets.

Eyelets are VERY simple to attach. My fingers are a little bruised after putting in 60 of these babies, but other than that it was so simple! I would be happy to do a tutorial on this if anyone is interested. But for now I will just run you through it.

Since I already had holes made, I just needed to clip a little into the hole to be able to push one side of the eyelet in. Then I flipped the fabric over to the back & place the smaller eyelet onto the larger one. Using the eyelet tool, the eyelet face-down on your anvil, tap the stick-tool-thingy with a hammer a few times and that's it!