Baby gift: Color Book
Many years ago I found an idea on a craft blog to make a color/texture soft baby book. I first made one for my oldest daughter. Here it is:
This little book has gotten so much use over the years. I now save scraps for the primary reason of making more of these books. I often make them for baby shower gifts. I've done several different kinds including mini color books. It's been awhile though, so for this most recent baby shower, I decided to make a deluxe one. All 12 colors that I save scraps for, plus a cover, in a large 10x10 inch size. It closes with a velcro strap.
I have some Very Hungry Caterpillar fabric that I bought a few years ago for a different color book gift, and I used it for the cover. I considered embroidering a title or design instead, but I liked the simplicity of this.
I made one page per color, with 12 colors. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, brown, black, white, silver, and gold. These books can get pretty thick so I considered dropping some, but had such a hard time picking that I just went all out.
When I make these books, my priority is to use as many fun textured fabrics as possible. Some colors I don't have as many scraps, like yellow, orange, and gold, so I work with what I have. But others, like blue and green, I always have a ton of choices. You can't tell from the photos, but I use a lot of minky, velboa, velvet, and other textured fabrics. Sometimes I pick a design, like the sun for yellow, or the tree for green. Sometimes I go very geometric and do squares or rectangles or triangles. Sometimes I just start sewing one layer and then add on until I get a result I like. That's the real fun part of the process, making each page different.
This one was quite thick, so I could only sew together two pages at a time. I sewed together the middle two pages, and then sewed the top and bottom layer to the middle pages on either side of the middle seam. This ended up looking pretty cool on the spine and should be pretty secure.
It's a lengthy project if you go all crazy like I did, but can also be much simpler. Here are some other books I've done.
