Baseball Quiet Book

Hot off the press (or the sewing machine)! This weekend is my youngest grandbaby’s first birthday. He will be getting a quiet book I designed just for him. He doesn’t know it yet but he is a baseball fan. He has to be. His dad loves the Astros. He has an older brother (nearly 5 years old) who can play amazing baseball. And his middle brother is proving to be good at it to.

But Levi gets the Baseball Quiet Book because, like everyone else the past couple of months, I have had extra time.
In case you’re reading this ten years from now and forget what was happening the Spring/Summer of 2020, we’re in a pandemic. Lots of time spent at home with family. Lots of time to pursue my passion of sewing.

This is the 4th quiet book I’ve made. My first was over 30 years ago. All 6 of my boys as well as my grandchildren have played with it. The other 2 quiet books I made for my 2 oldest boys’ children. You can see them in the blog post here: Quiet Books.  Maybe some day I’ll take pictures of the original one and post it as well.  But tonight I am going to share pictures and descriptions of the Baseball Quiet Book.

The cover of the quiet book is made of sturdy fabric that can withstand some rigorous play and hopefully last for years.  I sewed a strip of baseball ribbon down the inside middle inserting key rings to attach the pages to. Kind of like a 3-ring binder.  There is a picture of just the cover with the ribbon and key rings at the Quiet Books link above.

The pages of the book have iron on interfacing to give them some extra strength and body.  Each page is cut twice its width and the front and back activities are sewed in place.  After the activities are finished, I sew around the edges (right sides together), turn and top stitch close to the edge all the way around.   Eyelets are put in place and then the pages are slid onto the key ring.

Every page in a quiet book should give the child the opportunity to develop his fine motor skills. Each book should have a zipper, a button, a snap, velcro, counting, tying, color recognition, etc. The theme of the book doesn’t matter as long as activities like these are included. In fact, none of the other books I’ve made has had a theme at all. They’ve just been a jumble of activities that would be intriguing to a child.

This book has a theme. Each page relates to a day at the ballpark. Minute Maid Park in particular, where the Astros play. The flags, the train, the fireworks, the food, all of it can be found at an Astros game in Minute Maid Park.

Flags

The idea for flags was the first one I came up with and pretty much the one that determined I would make this a baseball book. Josiah, the oldest, loves to sing the national anthem. I had tried to think of all kinds of ways to make my own flag but knew I would just a make a mess of things. It was my husband’s idea to buy patches and attach them to cords. The patches are iron-on so I ironed them on to a piece of fabric that matches the page’s background fabric. The flags can be lowered and raised by pulling on the white cord.

Hat/Shirt

Getting dressed for a ballgame is part of the fun. Hat, shirt, shoes, glove? Ready to go!

Color Matching Hats

Everyone needs to wear a baseball hat to a baseball game. Choosing which one makes it that much more fun. While none of these are necessarily the Astros colors, the color matching will help the boys with their color recognition skills as well as learning to use snaps.

Shirt

Learning to button a shirt is essential. This baseball shirt opens up to an astros t-shirt hiding underneath. I was so excited to make these button holes. I recently bought a new sewing machine. The first new one I had had since 1981. It makes beautiful button holes with ease. I wanted to make more so Orbit near the end of the book has a shirt that buttons too.

Glove/Shoe

As I was sewing this glove I realized that this fabric, found in my scrap stash, is the same fabric I used to make the puppy dog I put on the cover of the first quiet book. I’ve carried that fabric from city to city and even out of state as we’ve moved from place to place. I have a little bit left. I think I’ll hang onto it in case I need it again someday.

Glove

All of the quiet books I have made so far has some sort of mitt to put your hand inside. What better than a baseball glove in this baseball themed book. I learn as I go with these kinds of projects. Lesson learned here was that I should’ve top stitched with black thread instead of brown. I used brown on the glove on the front cover. It shows up the details better.

Shoe

Lacing and tying a shoe is challenging. Hopefully this one will allow for some practice. The glove, shirt, train, and this shoe were all based on coloring pictures I found online. The simple lines found in coloring books make it easy to cut out and applique onto the background fabric. Using bright contrasting colors help little eyes to see what they are doing when they tie the shoe.

Hotdog/Popcorn

The hotdog bag and the popcorn bag are the same. I didn’t originally plan it that way but I was having trouble figuring out what to put the hotdog in. The first attempt just looked really lame. I figured I’d just do two of the same thing. Since the hotdog was the last page I did, I guess I was getting tired and losing my creativity at that point. It would have been better if I had sewn across the tops of each of the food bags. The contents come out a little too easily the way they are.

Hotdog

I was totally winging it with this hotdog. The bun is a little wonky but once it’s all put together it looks quite tasty. I was thrilled to find the fabric for the meat actually in my scrap stash. In fact everything on this page except the ric-rac was in my scrap stash.

Popcorn

What’s a ballgame with popcorn? There are two kinds of popcorn inside this zippered popcorn bag. I originally sewed some flat ones but they just didn’t look very inviting. After finishing the book I thought I’d try my hand at crocheting some fluffy ones. The fluffy ones really look like popcorn.

Astros

There are 9 rows of beads to mimic the idea of the scoreboard and the nine innings. I put the letters for Astros across the top because there was all that extra space. One of my sons told me, after it was all done, that the letters should have spelled “score”. He’s probably right but then there would’ve been 2 letters on one page and 3 on the other. That would never work so Astros it is.

I got to use my Cricut Maker to cut out the letters. What a great machine. They cut out beautifully. I sewed around the edges with a satin stitch and sewed some velcro on the back. It was a lot easier than if I had had to cut the letters out myself.

Orbit/Train

Orbit and the Train were pictures found online. I was afraid to do Orbit. Anytime I try to copy a character I get a little nervous. He turned out okay. Hopefully those who know Orbit will know that this is him.

Orbit

For those who don’t know Orbit, he’s the Astros’ mascot. He’s a dumpy, green, space guy. His face seemed perfect to make a Mr Potato Head type activity. Let’s hope the nose doesn’t disappear like it did for my first quiet book.

Train

Everytime an Astro hits a homerun in Minute Maid Park the train gets to make its trek across the stadium roof. It’s always an exciting thing to watch. This train needs help keeping it’s parts together so practice with velcro is the order of the day. The sun with the ribbon rays is there just for fun.

Fireworks

A win for the Astros means fireworks at the end of the game. This activity was a challenge but I ended up with this firecracker / rocket type apparatus. Pull on the nose of the rocket and the firework opens up. To close it, pull down on the beads at the bottom and the fireworks fold back into place. The beads would just dangle if left as they were so there is a velcro lock that keeps them in place when not being used.

Whew! It’s done. I love projects like this but when I’m working on it, it’s all I can think of. I am either physically working on it or brain storming and planning just about every minute until it is done. Plus the house is a mess while I’m working on it. The mess from the project itself and the mess from not doing the housework that needs to be done adds up.