Spring Bookshelf Mini-Quilt Tutorial

Bookshelf quilts are easy to put together and leave plenty of room for improvising with scraps and adding fun details.  March is National Reading Month, and this is the perfect way to celebrate!  Books and reading have always been big themes on my blog, and I've even made bookshelf quilts before, but I thought it was time for another one and to try adding titles this time.

This one was inspired by a mini-quilt swap I signed up for.  The recipient said she loved "Tiffany Blue, Hot Pink, and Lavender" and she was also a huge book nerd so I used those colors as my starting point.

I love the new "Scribble Stitch" technique I learned to add the titles and love the poofy look that the  Nature-Fil™ Wool Batting gives to it.

You can find my full tutorial for making your own Spring Bookshelf Quilt over on the Fairfield site.

Here are a couple of favorite bookshelf quilts from the past:
Teacher Retirement Book Quilt

Kindergarten Book Quilt

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Giant Quilted Book Cushion Tutorial - Lesson 2 of 2

We made these awesome giant book cushions for the reading corner in our elementary school library.

A huge thank you to Fairfield for making these cushions possible.  They provided me with the foam and batting and compensated me for writing this post.  All opinions and ideas are my own.

The kids love them, and I hope they get the elementary kids excited about science and exploring more non-fiction books.

Olivia (the Pig) Outfit or Costume

I made this outfit clear back in March to be part of For the LOVE of Books and I just didn't get it posted.

We've loved Olivia at our house for a long time.  The stories are funny and the illustrations are wonderful.

If you're not familiar with the Olivia books by Ian Falconer, you're missing out.

Not-So-Fancy Fancy-Nancy Quilt

What do you get when you sew a really simple quilt top including fun Fancy Nancy fabric?  A Not-so-Fancy Fancy-Nancy Quilt.

We are HUGE fans of Fancy Nancy at our house.  If you're not familiar with Fancy Nancy...she's a little girl who LOVES to be fancy and to use fancy words.    Sometimes being fancy creates problems to be solved though, and each book teaches 5-7ish "fancy" words to increase kids vocabulary.  Add to that the fact that Robin Preiss Glasser's illustrations are absolutely amazing, and you've got some wonderful books.

Fancy Nancy books were some of the first "real" books that Katie loved enough to make it worth her effort WANT to read.  And now several years later, Becca is every bit as much in love with them.  Of course, now several years later we have collected even more Fancy Nancy books.  I'm not sure whether I'm proud or ashamed to say that this isn't even all of our books...just the ones we could find the day we were taking pictures.  I pick most of them up at thrift stores or used book websites.  Fancy Nancy Books (affiliate link) make great gifts for girls around 4-6 years old, and there are tons to choose from.

And in fact today, just before writing this our copy of the newest Fancy Nancy Book just arrived in the mail.  Fancy Nancy and the Wedding of the Century. (affiliate link)  The girls were reading it without seconds of walking into the house from the post office.

Anyway, a couple years ago when Katie had outgrown the books and Becca wasn't quite in love with them, I found some fun Fancy Nancy fabric on clearance at JoAnns...that right for around $4 a yard.  I figured it would be perfect for a hospital quilt for some little girl in love with Fancy Nancy, so I cut it into 6 inch strips...and they sat on my self for around a year.

120+ Fabrics Inspired by Children's Books

We love fabric and we love children's books...so we really LOVE fabric inspired by our favorite children's books.  Since we've been celebrating books all last month here at Pieces by Polly...and we're pretty much always celebrating fabric around here, I thought it would be fun to do a little of both.

I've rounded up links to over 120 fabrics inspired by Children's books, plus you can enter my giveaway for some fun book fabric panels here.

While, I'm generally not a fan of licensed fabric (sorry, Dora the Explorer, Seahawks, and Tinkerbell fans...those fabrics just aren't for me!), I do have a huge weak spot for fabric inspired by the art in our favorite children's books...even more so when the illustrator themselves were involved with designing the fabric.  With the right fabric, you can turn any project into something that will inspire your kids to love books.

It can be surprising hard to find discover some of these collections, if you don't already know what's out there (try googling "book fabric" and you're likely to be searching for a while.)  So...I thought I'd do a round-up of some of my favorites.  A big thanks to my fabric sponsors who all suggested a few lines I didn't know about...including some lines that they didn't carry themselves.

Fabric lines go in and out of print, just like books.  Actually...not quite like books because many fabrics tend to go out of print within a year or two...sometimes the fabric company reprints popular lines...and sometimes not.  I've been working on this post for a couple weeks, and at the time I found the fabric, all of the links went to active listings.  Inventories of fabric shops can fluctuate quickly.  If the shop I've linked to, no longer carries the fabric, try doing a Google, Etsy, or eBay search to see if you can find it somewhere else.

And if you know of fabric likes that are based on children's books that I missed, please let me know in the comments.  I'd love to add to this post or do a follow up post as new lines come out.

Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! by Mo Willems for Cloud 9 Fabrics
I decided to start out with this fabric because it is currently my favorite book fabric.  If you haven't been so lucky as to come across Mo Willem's books, you need to go to your library or favorite bookstore and find some.  They weren't around when I was a kid, but they are FUNNY and they're easy to read...perfect for beginning readers who need a FUN read to draw them in.  If you follow Cloud 9 Fabric on Instagram, you may have seen this post that implies they're working on a Knuffle Bunny line, but I'm really keeping my fingers crossed that Mo Willems and Cloud 9 fabrics will come up with Elephant and Piggie fabrics before all my kids grow out of their books.  (Anson's only 2 though...so that gives them a few years.) 

The Pigeon Chorus Line Repeat, The Pigeon Frenzied, Organic Pigeon Speak, The Pigeon Dreams!, Pigeon Cheater Print, Pigeon Feathers Mint/Blue, Organic Pigeon Stripes, Pigeon Feathers White,

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Andover Fabrics - We've loved the Very Hungry Caterpillar around here for a LONG time.  Back when Becca turned one (and my blog was very young), I made her a special Very Hungry Caterpillar shirt and skirt, and we also made her a Very Hungry Cateripillar Cupcake Cake.  I am in LOVE with this Very Hungry Caterpillar Line by Eric Carle for Andover Fabrics.  Now that I've done several things with Dr. Seuss, I may just need to move on to Eric Carle as my next fabric obsession.  I am definitely going to have to get my hands on some of these.

Mostly left to right and top to bottom: Very Hungry Caterpillar Fat Quarter plus Panel from Sisters and Quilters, Very Hungry Caterpillar-Large, Very Hungry Catterpillar Abstract Dots, Very Hungry Caterpillar Yellow Numbers, Very Hungry Caterpillar Scattered Dots White, Very Hungry Caterpillar Grass Red, Very Hungry Caterpillar Dots Multi,  Very Hungry Caterpillar Panel, Very Hungry Caterpillar Small Scattered Fruit, Very Hungry Caterpillar Green Grass, Very Hungry Caterpillar Grass Blue, Very Hungry Caterpillar Food Stripe

Goodnight Moon from Cloud 9 Fabrics and Quilting Treasures - We've probably got 3 or 4 copies of Goodnight Moon at our house.  Both of our adopted kids received copies from their birth parents as babies and we've been given a couple other copies as well.  It's so hard to pick a favorite...but my favorite just might be the little yellow mice print.

Goodnight Moon Half-Yard Bundle from Honey Bee Good, Goodnight Moon Organic Mouse Yellow, Goodnight Moon Green Bunnies, Goodnight Moon Diagonal Stripes Yellow and Green, Goodnight Moon Stars by Quilting Treasures,  Goodnight Moon Orange Bunnies, Goodnight Moon Organic Red and White Balloon, Goodnight Moon Diagonal Stripe Blue and White, Goodnight Moon Cats and Kittens Yellow, Goodnight Moon Half Moons, Goodnight Moon Panel,

Book Themed Fabric Giveaway from You Keep Me in Stitches!!

I've been working on an epic post about book themed fabrics for a couple weeks.  As part of my research, I emailed my awesome sponsors to find out what fabrics they knew about both, both in and out of their shops.

Patty from You Keep Me in Stitches and Granma's Treasures responded with not only a lot of suggestions, but offered to do a giveaway of some of her favorite panels to be turned a soft book or a quilt.

And even better...we're going to have 5 (That's right FIVE!) winners, so your chances are really good.  Up for grabs are these fun panels...

Busy Town On the Move by Richard Scary for Quilting Treasures

Busy Town To the Rescue Panel by Richard Scary for Quilting Treasures

A Fuzzy Duckling (Little Golden Book) Panel by Quilting Treasures

Fairy Tale Friends Panel by American Jane

And last but not least...The Shy Little Kitten (The Little Golden Books!)

PLUS you can get 15% off your purchase from You Keep Me in Stitches right now by entering the code "BIRTHDAY15" as the code at check out.

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Please show my sponsors some love...

Surrounded by Love (Fireworks) - From You Keep Me in Stitches

Berenstein Bear Fabric - You Keep Me in Stitches

Spring House/Queen Anne fabric from You Keep Me in Stitches

Hexies by Halves PDF Pattern - Pieces by Polly

Pinkalicious Baby Quilt

There's nothing sweeter for a baby girl than lots of pink, and this quilt is definitely that.

Some of you might remember when I made Katie a new version of one of her favorite baby blankets that is in tatters.
(And I have to say that Katie preferred that I just call this quilt Pink #3...NOT Pinkalicious, but Pinkalicious is just too fun, and it fits in with our theme of our For the LOVE of BOOKS series going on this month.

My sister had saved the extra fabric from the project for all these years.  I still had some of the fabric left over, and since the fabric was so special, I figured it was perfect for making a baby quilt for her sister.