Fabric Alphabet Book

When I made my first batch of needle books, my granddaughter liked them and, when I gave one to my daughter, my granddaughter was a little down because, “Mama won’t share it with me”.  What’s a 4-year-old going to do with a needle book?!?  So, after she had said that, I knew I had to make something for her, and I came up with this fabric alphabet book.  I’m going to try to do a tutorial here, so bear with this long post and let me know if something isn’t clear and I’ll edit.

I found all the images on Pinterest.  I love that the cover I chose pictures two little girls because the second grandchild {due in about 4 1/2 months} is a girl! 

I used muslin for the cover and an alphabet fabric for the back.  A supply list can be found at the end of this post.

I cut the cover fabrics 7 x 9 and cut a binding strip as long and about 2 inches wide.  I used the same fabric as the back and inside covers and it blends really well, although it may be hard for you to see.

At this point, if you want to add a tie or elastic this is when you need to do it.  I ordered a bunch of assorted pink buttons from an Etsy seller and had hair elastics already, so I chose to go this way for my book closure.  You could also use ribbon on both sides to have it be a tie closure, but I thought it would be easier for younger children to just slip the elastic on and off the button. 

I added the button to the front outside cover after the cover was all sewn together.  Once you have the batting and inside cover fabric cut, you will sew the outside cover, the inside cover and the batting together ~ batting on wrong side of cover fabric; the inside cover fabric should be right sides together with front cover {so the batting will be exposed on the one side and the wrong side of the inside cover will be on the other side}. 

Leave a small opening at the bottom for turning.

Now is when I added the button for the closure.   You can see here how that will wind up looking with the elastic and button in place.

The inside pages are made with felt and I did iron-on images of each letter “flash card” onto muslin. 

I did the images in 4 x 6 size and fit two onto a sheet of transfer paper.  One piece of felt will become 4 pages.  The size of the felt dictated the size of the book and the alphabet image. One piece of felt folded in half is about 5 x 7.

 

Very Important: You must remember this is going to be a book with the pages sewn down the middle, so pages 1 and 2 would be A & B and pages 3 and 4 would be Y & Z.  You will need to remember to set the pages up like this {see picture below} and it might be a good idea to pin all the letter fabric to the felt pages, and then sew them once you have made sure all the letters are set up correctly. 

I then sewed the muslin onto the felt.   I’ve included some samples of how the pages look.

The only hiccup was that there would be two letters that only needed one side of felt.  After figuring things out before I sewed, I decided it would be letters K and L.

I pinned the muslin letters onto the felt as I did for the other pages and folded the felt over, allowing just a little bit more for the side where the letters were.  I wanted to allow enough room for me to be able to sew it in.  Then I cut the felt page {as you can see above}.  I actually wound up sewing it to the page with J and Q.

I put the other pages in place and then you want to attach the pages to the book cover.  You will center them, pin, and sew down the center.

Here it is all sewn together and you can’t even see where I had sewn the K and L page in separately.

And here is where it was sewn down the middle attaching all the pages.

In the back I put a pocket for pencils and a pad of paper so she can practice writing her letters.  I also added a little label that says “made with love” that I cut from one of my sewing themed fabrics that had a lot of sewing phrases.

Just to backtrack, if you want to add a pocket, you will want to have that piece of fabric cut and sewn on the inside back cover piece of fabric before you put your outside cover, batting, and inside cover together.  Alternatively, you can put the pocket on the last page of felt.

Since it is just as easy to make two as it is one, I made a second one with a different cover chosen by my friend/co-worker, who will be making a trip to visit her own little granddaughter in Australia soon.   Here’s the cover she picked.

And here is the fabric I found for her book back cover and inside.

I know she will love it and I hope her granddaughter will get a lot of enjoyment out of it!

Now my granddaughter has her own little fabric book and one that will help her with her ABC’s!

Supplies Used:

• Muslin fabric – {I bought a yard}
• Fabric for back and inside covers
• Fabric {scrap} for book “binding”
• Batting
• Felt for pages – 7 pieces {each piece will hold 4 letters}
• Thread
• Buttons – for closure and decoration
• Elastic – for closure

Please feel free to email me with any questions!  In case you were wondering, these will not be making an appearance in my Etsy shop.

While I have a couple of more sewing projects I will be working on {two baby quilts and a couple of “cheater” sundresses}, I also have home décor related projects coming up to share as well ~ three to be exact!