Quiet Book

Yeah - first project finished. This is Rainbow Girl's quiet book. This book took a long time in planning. I wanted it to be Australian, relevant to Rainbow girl's experiences, tell a story and have lots of interactive features.

Page 1 This little doll starts in a pocket on the front cover. I'm really pleased with how she turned out - a little miniature Rainbow Girl. Her elastic waisted pants and press stud closed top are removable.

Page 2 The wheel spins around the centre button so that you can see different things out the window.

Page 3 This little backpack holds the loose pieces for the coming page. It has a drawstring. I'm thinking of using this basic pattern to make a life size backpack for Rainbow.

Page 4 The baby animals are joined to their mothers with a hook and eye. They're made of leather and fleece for the tactile nature.

Page 5 The fruit is held on with press studs. Underneath are the inside of the fruit.

Page 6 The echidna slides along the ribbon to eat the ants. I love the little hand embroidered ants.

Page 7 The spider and spider orchid are buttoned on.

Page 8 The camera. This one is a bit fiddly to operate. When you pull the ribbons it reveals 3 different photos of Rainbow girl out bush.

Page 9 The sausage are attached with Velcro and can be moved from the BBQ to the hot dog buns.

Page 10 The tent zips open. Inside is a little fake fur bilby.

It's mostly made of felt which I love working with for its luxurious tactile nature (for both the sewer and recipient), it's firm for hand embroidery (and I need all the help I can) and it doesn’t fray. Because of thickness – doesn’t lie flat – pieces need to be even further in from edges
The downside is that it would have been much cheaper to have made the pages out of calico. The pages are also very bulky so the book doesn't look neat when closed and even my fabulous walking foot struggled getting through the layers to sew the centre seam. I possibly should have made the outer pages progressively bigger.

Recently I came across this tutorial http://quietbook.blogspot.com/ which I wish I'd seen before making mine. The idea of binding the pages with a ring is great. It would make the book easy to use in the car and also means you can add and remove the pages starting with tactile ones for a baby and then adding the more challenging ones on as they grow. I also like the addition of extras like a card game. finger puppets and pencil and paper to really extend the use. Wouldn't that be great for long trips. I've already started thinking about a food / cooking book for Moonshine... but first I've got more UFOs.