Take a deep, cleansing breath with me librarians… aaahhhhhhhhh… Summer Reading is winding down.

This summer my library went with the iRead theme, Reading Is Soooooo Delicious.  It’s been a great summer, but it’s nice to have a little time/room to breath.

Anyway, in support of this theme, my brilliant co-worker Ms Arianne Carey, decided we should all wear chef’s coats or aprons. I went with an apron.

The other day as I was folding it up and packing it away, I remembered I’ve been meaning to buy a felt story apron for a while now. So I decided to repurpose it with some felt that we have on hand. I chose a light neutral gray. I knew I needed to use 2 pieces of felt because we didn’t have a single piece large enough to cover the entire apron.

I rolled out the butcher paper, and laid out the apron to make a pattern.  I traced and cut the pattern. Then I cut the pattern into 2 pieces: the skirt and the chest piece using the apron strings a guiding line.  The I cut the 2 pieces of felt using the pattern. I glued the felt to the apron, let it dry, and then sewed the 2 pieces of felt using whip stitch.

 

I used it at my storytimes this week, and it worked awesome! WARNING: an apron works best for stories; as anything that encourages participation (guessing games, discussion flannel activities, etc.) will inevitably lead to boob-grabbing.  But for telling conventional flannel stories, having the story unfold on your belly, encourages storytimers to focus their shifty little eyeballs on you.

Liz is our lovely host this week, so check out putting smiles on faces…Thanks Liz.