Let’s tiptoe down memory lane to see what I was doing during the sixth week of every year since the start of Shiny Happy World. 🙂 Click on the images to go to the posts.
2011
Perfect for flower petals, raindrops, and more.
2012
All my best tips in one post.
2013
A handy skill for lots of projects.
2014
A free tutorial.
2015
The envelope is a cute little pocket.
2016
My favorite way to hand quilt.
2017
***eligible for Week 6 sale***
Pretty little hand-stitched hearts.
2018
A super secure attachment.
2019
***eligible for Week 6 sale***
Change their look just by changing the angle of the eyelids.
2020
A fun drawing project to learn how to use my iPad.
Let’s tiptoe down memory lane to see what I was doing during the fifth week of every year since the start of Shiny Happy World. 🙂 Click on the images to go to the posts.
2011
Simple craft project – and a fun game!
2012
Fun!
2013
Use these tips for any skinny tubes.
2014
A basic intro.
2015
One of my favorite free patterns.
2016
Combine this free bib pattern with any applique pattern for an adorable gift!
2017
Round and round with simple hand stitching. It’s my meditation.
2018
Crochet a simple little heart to add to any softie.
2019
***eligible for Week 5 sale***
A groovy lion.
2020
***eligible for Week 5 sale***
A cute monster with a pocket mouth.
2021
***eligible for Week 5 sale***
An adorable Pip the Cat made by Holly.
2022
***eligible for Week 5 sale***
So handsome.
2023
***eligible for Week 5 sale***
Will he see his shadow?
2024
A free pattern for waves that you can add to any animal applique block – or use on their own.
Add some waves to your quilts with this free applique pattern!
In addition to the wavy stripes you see in the top image, the free pattern also includes a template designed to use at the bottom of a block, in combination with an animal applique.
Here’s an example.
These waves will work particularly well with the following patterns:
Let’s tiptoe down memory lane to see what I was doing during the fourth week of every year since the start of Shiny Happy World. 🙂 Click on the images to go to the posts.
2011
***eligible for Week 4 sale***
Fun little monster faces–great to use on lots of ways
2012
Great for last-minute gift-making.
2013
I use this method to add eyes to furry monster blocks.
2014
Perfect for using up tiny felt and thread scraps.
2015
Free pattern and easily adaptable for any size softie.
2016
So many scraps!
2017
My best tips for outline stitching.
2018
Helpful tips for choosing quilt fabrics.
2019
***eligible for Week 4 sale***
An easy-to-make bunny.
2020
Playing around with animation–you’ll need to click to see it in action. 🙂
2021
***eligible for Week 4 sale***
The first block I made in my 100 Birds project – which became the Backyard Birds pattern.
Let’s tiptoe down memory lane to see what I was doing during the third week of every year since the start of Shiny Happy World. 🙂 Click on the images to go to the posts.
2011
My favorite outline stitch.
2012
Happy wrists make a happy stitcher. 🙂
2013
These are so much fun to slip into a child’s pocket on a chilly day.
2014
All the final steps.
2015
***eligible for Week 3 sale***
Make a cuddly monkey.
2016
This is traditional hand quilting.
2017
***eligible for Week 3 sale***
The balloon string is a thread-wrapped pie cleaner, so it sways ever so gently. I love it.
2018
Cutting table and storage–easy to find items from Target plus a single sheet of wood.
2019
All the tutorials in one place.
2020
***eligible for Week 3 sale***
He’s a very dapper fellow.
2021
***eligible for Week 3 sale***
I love this sample I made in fantasy colors. 🙂
2022
My favorite feet – the ones I use all the time.
2023
I designed Valentine’s Day fabric using some of my favorite faces. 🙂
Let’s tiptoe down memory lane to see what I was doing during the second week of every year since the start of Shiny Happy World. 🙂 Click on the images to go to the posts.
2011
A great way to practice sewing straight lines and turning corners.
2012
***eligible for Week 2 sale***
Still one of my bestselling embroidery patterns.
2013
Fur is fun!
2014
Now my favorite way to make a quilt.
2015
I’m still reaping the benefits of this, many years later.
2016
It makes an exceptionally huggable, soft doll.
2017
***eligible for Week 2 sale***
A very simple pattern – great for beginners!
2018
Make it with or without an applique.
2019
***eligible for Week 2 sale***
Ready to hibernate. 🙂
2020
The start of a very fun hand-stitching project.
2021
***eligible for Week 2 sale***
Donna made this adorably fluffy version of Dalton Dog, maybe using the faux fur tutorial I shared eight years previously?
2022
The easiest and most cost-effective way to get a wide variety of my blenders.
2023
Trying my hand at a floral fabric design for a Spoonflower challenge. This is jimsonweed.
Let’s tiptoe down memory lane to see what I was doing during the first week of every year since the start of Shiny Happy World. 🙂 Click on the images to go to the posts.
2011
My very first embroidery pattern! I designed it especially for beginners. It uses only one stitch!
If I were making this today I’d back that white fabric with some interfacing so my thread tails wouldn’t shadow through to the front. 🙂
2012
In a nutshell? Anything! This post walks you through any special tools that will make weird fabrics easier.
2013
For perfect monster teeth.
2014
Because freckles are super cute.
2015
For my fellow optimists. 🙂
2016
***eligible for Week 1 sale***
An adorable dressable rag doll.
2017
***eligible for Week 1 sale***
Another adorable dressable rag doll! This is back when the Dress Up Bunch Club was happening. I introduced a new doll at the start of the year and then she was the model for a new clothing and accessories pattern every month that year. After a couple of years she had a VAST wardrobe – far better than my own. 🙂
2018
This post has tips that work for both sewn and crocheted softies.
2019
It’s different than every other way you measure gauge.
2020
In 2020 I decided I wanted to learn to use Procreate on my iPad. I started by just drawing a dot every day. Simple. No pressure. And a great way to try out different brushes. This is one of my favorites.
2021
More happy thoughts for the new year! This is clearly a theme. 🙂
People call them cloth books, quiet books, soft books – whatever you call them they’re easy and fun to make and a great way to get extra use out of your patterns.
The instructions below are for a 12-page book, 8 inches square, with flannel “batting” to make the pages extra soft and snuggly.
Here’s what mine looked like after filling it out.
The top of the worksheet is your planning guide. It lays out what the pages will look like when you’re reading them.
I decided to call my book Who’s Grumpy? I put one face on each page, including mostly smiling faces but one very grumpy cat. I deliberately placed the cat on an odd-numbered page so when someone is flipping the pages, that’s the immediate “reveal.” I’m imagining a kid pointing and calling out,”He’s grumpy!” as soon as you turn that page. 🙂
My book is a random collection of animals, but you can do anything!
Make a collection of a child’s favorite animals.
Make a souvenir of a visit to the zoo and the animals you saw there.
Make a collection of the animals native to your area.
Use this free ABC pattern to put an animal face on the even pages, and the sound that animal makes on the odd pages.
Make a Christmas book with the free patterns here.
The bottom of the worksheet is your construction guide. It shows how you need to make the pages so that when you put them all together it reads like you planned in the top of the worksheet. So, for example, the animal for page two (the koala) needs to be on the same rectangle of fabric as the animal for page 11 (the hippo).
Materials
You’ll need 3/4 yard of fabric for your book, and 3/4 yard of flannel.
I recommend pre-washing both the fabric and the flannel, and I actually recommend washing and drying the flannel one extra time because that stuff has a tendency to shrink a lot.
You’ll also need fusible adhesive. I use Heat & Bond Lite for all my quilts.
Cutting Instructions and Applique Preparation
From the fabric, cut 6 rectangles each 8 1/2 inches x 17 inches.
From the flannel cut 6 rectangles each 8 inches x 16 1/2 inches.
Print or trace your applique templates. Since my book is 8 inches square and my patterns are all designed to fit in 10 inch squares, I printed all the template pages at 80% size. There’s more info about resizing patterns here.
Instructions
Fold your fabric rectangles in half and press the fold to mark what will be the spine of the book.
Fuse your appliques. (Those little cards with the numbers are my page numbers, just helping me to keep everything organized while I worked.)
I usually make my quilt blocks “snapshot style.” By that I mean I imagine that I’ve snapped a photo of the animal, zoomed way in on its face. Here’s an example.
I’m trying to make it look like she has a lower body – it’s just cropped out of the photo – and I achieve that effect by lining the cut edge of the bottom of the applique like up with the raw edge at the bottom of my block. You can do this in your soft book exactly the same way. Just line up the straight edge at the bottom of the applique piece with the bottom edge of the page so both raw edges get included in the stitching when you finish the page edges.
For my book I decided to float the heads in the middle of the block – what I call “emoji style.” When I do that, I just don’t use the shoulder or body pieces. That means I had to choose animals where the head and body are separate pieces, so I didn’t include anything like this bear.
See? No way to separate the head from the body.
That was a little design digression. Now, back to the instructions. 🙂
Center a flannel rectangle on the back of each page rectangle. I cut the flannel smaller than the fabric in order to de-bulk the edges of the pages.
I used spray adhesive because every few years I forget how much I hate it and I give it another try before swearing off it for another few years. It would have been a lot easier (and less messy) to just dab a little fabric glue stick in each corner and a swipe down the center. 😛
Outline the applique. I just use a simple straight stitch with black thread.
It all worked out fine, but since I used fabric paint for mine catchlights, it means for the rest of the process I had to be very careful not to iron over the eyes. It would have been easier to add the catchlights at the very end.
Now comes the fun part – finishing the pages.
Sew pages 12/1 to pages 2/11, right sides facing, using 1/4-inch seam allowance all around. Leave a 4-5 inch opening for turning.
Repeat with pages 6/7 and 8/5.
Repeat with pages 4/9 and 10/3.
Clip the corners of each page and turn them right side out.
Here’s a close-up of the clipping. You want to get right up to the stitching without actually cutting the stitches.
Smooth all the edges, tuck the seam allowance in at the turning opening, and give it a good press.
You can close up that opening two ways.
Hand sew the opening closed using ladder stitch. This is slower, but completely invisible and results in the softest pages.
Topstitch the edges of the page all the way around, closing up the opening as you topstitch. This is faster, but results in a slightly stiffer page edge.
I chose option 2 – topstitching. I’m pretty sure the page edge will soften up over time, and even if it doesn’t it’s really not unpleasantly stiff. 🙂
Finally, stack the pages as follows.
Lay page 12/1 face down so that its back (page 2/11) is face up.
Over that lay page 10/3 face down so that its back (page 4/9) is facing up.
Over that lay page 8/5 face down so that its back (page 6/7) is facing up.
Sew the three layers together right down the spine of the book, using that pressed fold line as a guide. I stitched my spine twice for extra durability.
Close your book. You’re finished! Here’s my finished book. . .
Here are a bunch of additional ideas and links to further customize your book.
You can change the size of your book – just be sure to adjust the print size for your templates accordingly. I use 10-inches as the base for all my quilt blocks because it makes the math so dang easy. If you want a 9-inch book, print your templates at 90% size. If you want it to be 7.5 inches, print your templates at 75%. Easy peasy.
If you want to add or subtract pages, that will throw off the entire planning worksheet so you’d need to make your own. It also affects what batting you use in the pages. In my tests, even thin cotton batting was too puffy for a 12-page book, but it would probably work for an 8-page book. If you want to make yours longer than 12 pages, I’d recommend stabilizing the pages with interfacing instead of using the flannel.
Go crazy with fun special effects!
Maybe you want to use smooth shiny satin for your frog! Or fluffy fleece for your puppy. Or a little bit of white fur for the inner ears of the koala! This post will take you to the tutorial showing how to applique with satin, and at the bottom of that post there are links to tutorials for lots of other specialty fabrics.
Want to use an easy faux trapunto technique to give the koala a puffy nose?
Here are several free patterns that work with just some simple resizing. This post about making coasters has info about resizing an applique pattern that can be applied to any of these projects.
I design my quilts for 6 different sizes, from Itty Bitty Baby to King Size.
For each layout style, you’ll find a downloadable PDF with fabric requirements, cutting guides, and assembly diagrams for all six sizes in this post – Quilt Sizes and Supplies Needed.
Make adorable Christmas stockings using a yard of cut & sew fabric. These stockings are SUPER easy to make, and there are instructions printed right on the fabric. But if you’ve never sewn a stitch before and you want a little extra help you can find additional instructions (with videos) here.
Buy your fabric here. You need to get a full yard printed on any of Spoonflower’s fabric bases that are at least 56 inches wide. I used Organic Cotton Sateen because I love how the colors print on that fabric.
One yard gives you all the pieces you need for the following:
one large stocking (19 inches tall) fully lined with a contrasting cuff and hanging loop
one small stocking (10 inches tall) fully lined with a contrasting cuff
five small (5 1/2 inches tall) stockings perfect for filling with candy and hanging on the tree
Here’s a video showing ALL the steps.
If you’d rather have written instructions, here are all the steps – with links to a few additional videos you might find helpful.
Cut out stocking front and back, and the rectangle for the hanging loop. Do NOT cut the line between the main stocking (red) and the lining (light green).
To make the hanging loop, fold and press the rectangle in half the long way. Open, and fold each edge in to the center fold. Press. (There’s a video showing how to do this here.) Stitch down the long edge.
Pin stockings right sides together, sandwiching the hanging loop between the layers where indicated.
Sew around the edges using 1/4 inch seam allowance. Leave open for turning where indicated.
Clip seam allowance in concave curves. (There’s a video with more info about that here.) Turn right side out and press.
