The Tale of Two Teapots

My family is a tea drinking family. We love coffee too but I have more warm memories about tea and teapots than coffee. The song "I'm a Little Teapot, Short and Stout" brings back memories of my teen-aged aunts and me being about 3 years old. My grandmother served me tea from her yellow Hall teapot like this one when I was visiting her as a child. I remember Bigelow Constant Comment, still a favorite, and Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger, not a favorite but I loved it then!

The yellow teapot is one I found in an antique store and bought because it is just like the one my grandmother, who is 91, still uses.

This large white teapot was given to my grandmother by my great-great-aunt. My gandmother gave it to me because it is so big and she thought I could use a big one; I have 6 children and we use to have frequent "tea parties." This is a BIG teapot. It holds 1/2 gallon or 2 liters of tea and measures 7 1/2 inches tall, 12 from handle to tip of spout!

I started my children with "cambric tea" giving them a little tea with copious amounts of milk and sugar cubes. Cookies, scones, or some other sweets usually went with tea in those days and still do!

Tale of Two Tea Cozies

I was inspired by a piece of soft gray felt that I bought off a remnant rack to make a tea cozy for my large white teapot. I decided to make it fairly simple to go with the simplicity of the teapot. I had a desire to do some hand sewing but also finish a project in a day or two. Naturally one project inspires another, usually before the first is finished! I thought of making a tea cozy to send to my grandmother out of some squares I started last August. This was a nice last day of '07 and first day of '08 project - two tea-cozies finished in two days!

Book Binding Tutorial
for Journal with
Quilted And Felted Cover

Recently, I was asked if I have a pattern for my felted books. I decided to do a small simplified version, take pictures, and give some dimensions. I am going to show pictures and give some links to other sites because I don’t have time right now to draw and scan diagrams!

I am not going to use a lot of book binding terms because I don’t want to spend hours defining them! So I will try to keep it very simple.

It is always easier to try a new technique on a small scale and with easily accessible materials.

Make the quilted cover:

For the cover you need:

4 1/2 x 12 inch piece of polyester or wool felt (1 sheet cut in half length-wise)

Or 11.5 x 30.5 centimeters

small scraps of quilter's cotton fabric
yarn wool roving or dyed locks of wool (for use with needle felting tool)

Here are pictures of my example: pieced, felted, and quilted. See previous post for tutorial on how I use needle felting on a quilt.

When I was pleased with the look of my cover I trimmed it down to 4 inches wide, rounded the corners slightly, and finished the edges with zigzag stitch.

(If you don't want to do the needle felting this could be made without felting as a small slender quilt using batting with cotton fabric on top and bottom and lots of machine stitching to hold the layers together.)

Paper for pages:

I used 6 sheets Canson Mi-Teintes colored drawing paper from a 9x12 inch pad.

You could buy one large sheet and cut it or use what you have, even nice copier paper
(8 ½ x 11 inches) parchment or other paper with pleasant weight and color.

Cut paper 3 ½ x 8 inches long or 9 x 21.5 centimeters.

To make your book pages cut the paper to size, fold in half and burnish the fold for each page individually then nest sheets together to form a signature. Use 6 - 12 sheets nested together, depending upon the heaviness of the paper. With the Canson paper I used 6 pieces of paper (folios) per signatures (groups of pages that are nested together).

Make a pattern for the holes in the pages. Cut an extra page of cheap paper the size of your pages. Make a mark in the fold, at ½ inch, 1 ¾ inch, and 3 inches. That will put stitches ½ inch from the top and bottom and in the center. I used an awl to punch the sewing holes in each page. For years I used a sharp nail. The hole should be about the size of the thread and needle.

Sewing the pages into the cover

I used waxed linen thread and a sharp needle with a large eye appropriate for the thread. You could also use six strand cotton or linen embroidery thread or pearl cotton.

The pamphlet stitch is good for sewing each signature into the cover and is very easy and elegant! You can begin the stitch inside the book, like I did here, or outside on the spine for a different look. If you choose to make a really large book someday, you may need to reinforce the spine area and use a different stitch.

I made an effort to sew the signatures in straight. Sewing all the way through the cover, with the spine of the pages at a right angle to the cover’s edges. I put about 1/8 inches between signatures when I sewed them into the cover. If you expect to glue a lot of elements into your book you can leave more space at this time.

Odds and Ends

I crocheted a chain with two coordinating yarns for the wrap around tie.

I deckled the fore edge of the pages.

Feel free to ask questions in the comments. I may amend this as I see the need or leave comments.