Fabric Alphabet Book

Here’s another project I just finished as part of my big Catch Up. It has been bothering me because it’s time sensitive. The recipient is growing up fast! (Actually, it’s for two recipients – twins.) 

I just loved this panel when I saw it and it looked like it would be so easy to do! It was easy, but it should have been easier. The pattern was just printed a bit off the edge of the fabric, so nothing really lined up as well as it should have in theory. Plus, I don’t know if it was the printing, or how the fabric was wound on the bolt, or what, but the print was seriously skewed – as if the fabric was stretched out. When I cut out the pages, nothing was straight, and so it all came out a bit wonky. Finally, when it came to the final stitching up the center of the book, it was too thick to fit through my machine, so I (clumsily) hand sewed it. It all just adds to the charm, right?!

There is a page to add who the book is for and who made it, and this was my first time writing on a piece of fabric. I went to the regular craft store and bought a permanent fabric pen, and then practiced trying to write with it on some scrap fabric. It looked pretty awful, but better when I put a strip or two of painter’s tape on the back of it. I searched online to see if I could find any tips to make it look better, and I found a few people swearing by gel pens. The very next day I was meeting a friend at the local quilt shop, and lo and behold – permanent fabric gel pens! I still used painter’s tape on the back of the fabric when I wrote on it, but I had MUCH better luck with the gel pens. They both look fine, but the gel pen is so much easier to write with, and it caught on the fabric less than the other pen. Good to know!