Quiet Book Ideas

Make a quiet book for toddlers and preschoolers with interactive pieces, removable toys, colorful activities, and pages that can be taken out! It’s a simple and fun way to keep little ones occupied!

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This week I have been chatting with my friend Sarah from Frugal Fun for Boys and Girls about low-tech fun for kids– you know, for when we want them occupied and happy and **cough** quiet, but don’t necessarily want to default to screens.

With five kids in ten years, I’ve definitely had to learn how to keep the kiddos quiet and busy in church, at restaurants, waiting in the doctor’s office, on car rides, you get the picture. 

Want to know one of my go-to, top-secret (not really), best ideas?

Make a quiet book with interactive pieces, removable toys, colorful activities, and pages that can be taken out and given to multiple children. 

My kids’ quiet book is almost ten years old and is still going strong. This project does not involve very complicated sewing, but it can take time to put together the pages. The great thing is, though, that once the pages are done, they can be enjoyed for years to come.

Another idea to make the process of putting together your own quiet book is to make it a group effort! Making a quiet book is a great thing to turn into an exchange party. Everyone makes ten of one page, then gets together to exchange pages so that each person goes home with ten different pages.

What a great idea for the holidays! 

Quiet book ideas are really limitless, but keep scrolling and I’ll show you all of the pages in our quiet book and the materials we used, including one page based on one of my children’s favorite board books!

If you’re new to embroidery, but want to incorporate that into your book, I have a few simple tips to get you started.

Quiet Book Ideas ::

The Construction

The size of my book is 12″x12″. Big enough to keep kids engaged and small enough that I don’t mind adding it to a large tote. 

The pages are all cut from white cotton flannel. I cut each 12″ square out and then ironed mid-weight interfacing on the back to make them more reinforced. At that point, I added the design/activity to the page. Two completed pages were placed on top of each other, wrong sides together, and attached with bias tape to finish the edges.

I used 2 grommets in each page and 2 book rings to form the completed book. The book rings are nice because they make it easy to take a page or two out for sharing when more than one child wants to play with the book.

The Cover

The cover is made from cotton fabric and corduroy that i had on hand. I did not add any interfacing because with the bulk of the pages it wasn’t necessary. The edges are finished with white bias tape, just like on the pages.

The inside back side of the cover has a small pocket to store loose parts as needed. I found that I often needed to store the magnetic stars in there to keep them from falling off and being lost.

I sewed a simple strap with a magnetic closure to make it easy for my son to open and close the book himself.

The Pages

“Buckle Up”

{cotton fabric scraps, embroidery thread, assorted buckles}

This page is one of my kids’ favorite pages right now. Buckle. Unbuckle. Buckle. Unbuckle. Repeat again and again.

“Big Red Barn”

{felt, embroidery thread, plastic buttons}

This is another favorite page. It was inspired by this one. The animals inside the barn are finger puppets. The flowers and the butterfly are buttons that I sewed on. The butterfly slides back and forth on the string.

“Noah’s Ark”

{felt, velcro, small animals}

This is a fun page for older preschoolers/young children who want something more to play with. Lots of animals fit inside that little ark.

“Beep Beep”

{felt, cotton fabric scraps, embroidery thread, plastic buttons, pipe cleaners, elastic, ribbon, zipper}

Little robot inspired by this one. The arms are fabric tubes with pipe cleaners inside so they will bend and stay in place. The legs are tubes with elastic inside to stretch. The zipper creates a fun little pocket and the remaining buttons and ribbon are tactile fun.

“Blast Off”

{embroidery thread, ribbon, wooden decorative pieces, safety pin, magnets}

One more page inspired by Homemade By Jill. The spaceship is a wooden decorative piece found at the craft store. I hot glued a safety pin to the back and slide the ribbon through. The ship “blasts off” up the ribbon. The planet and stars are also wooden decorative pieces. The planet is fixed down with hot glue, but the stars have magnets on the back so they can be taken off and put back on again.

“Gone Camping”

{fabric scraps, zipper, felt, embroidery thread, stuffing}

Don’t ask me why I put a bear and a fire inside the tent. It seemed like a cute thing to do. But as a camping family, this one always makes me chuckle. No fires inside tents, kids! The bear, fire, and moon all have a little stuffing inside to make them more three-dimensional.

“The Shepherd & The Angel”

{cotton fabric scraps, felt, velcro, iron-on adhesive, Christmas finger puppets}

I made this page after I finished all the others because I wanted a page that would help me to tell the Christmas story to my toddler son. I found the finger puppets at Hobby Lobby in a little set for a couple of dollars. I glued velcro to them and made the hilltop scene.

“Away in a Manger”

{cotton fabric scraps, velcro, iron-on adhesive, Christmas finger puppets}

This is the second half of the set that I found at Hobby Lobby. Again, I glued velcro to the backs of the finger puppets and made the manger scene using fabric scraps and iron-on adhesive.

“The Little Blue Truck”

{felt, embroidery thread, velcro, animal stickers}

When my oldest was a toddler, Little Blue Truck was his favorite book. My husband and I had it memorized and could (and would) recite it in the car, no book needed. I used one of the pages in the book to create this scene. It’s my favorite in the book.

The truck is made from felt and I gave it more details with a fine-tip sharpie. It has velcro on it, too, so it can be moved down the road.

The animals (there used to be a page-full) and flowers are stickers which I glued to felt and then cut out. I glued the rough side of velcro to each of them so they could be rearranged on the page.

“God’s Promise”

{felt, embroidery thread, stiff felt, velcro}

I bought stiffer felt to use for the rainbow pieces on this page. Don’t forget ROY G BIV when making your rainbow. (I know there’s no P, but my choices were a limited). Each rainbow piece has two velcro pieces so they will stick to the felt.

“Wallet in my Pocket”

{old pocket or cotton fabric scraps, mid-weight fabric, ribbon, button, elastic, plastic cards}

The pocket was actually cut from an old pair of shorts that was in my scraps pile because I liked the print. I made a simple wallet and attached it to the shorts with the ribbon because I didn’t want it being used apart from the quiet book.

“Hanging Up the Laundry”

{felt, embroidery thread, stuffing, ribbon, flannel scraps, small clothespins, pipe cleaner, mid-weight fabric scraps}

This page is the one that has suffered the most loss over five years. The tops of the clothespins kept being pulled off and I stopped putting them back on. The basket used to be filled with clothes, but all that’s left are the pants. However, it would be simple to refresh the page.

The clothespins were glued down to the page. The sun has stuffing inside to make it more three-dimensional. The pipe cleaner serves as handles on the basket. The clothes were cut from flannel so I didn’t have to worry about finishing the edges. You could use felt for the clothes, too, but I wanted something with a print.

Hope you enjoyed a peek at our quiet book. Comment below and share if you’ve made a quiet book before, or if you have other good low-tech activity options. Find more simple crafts and DIY here.

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