My mom bought the beautiful Small Bible Felt Set from Betty Lukens for my children/me for Christmas. I fell in love with this company when my son got a farm felt book as a gift (but the gift-giver kindly had already cut everything out!) I was grateful to her for such a great gift. There are more backgrounds and overlays that I plan to buy (half the price of the boards), but this is enough to get me started! Now this has been a challenge. Cutting about 12 huge sheets of felt out.
Will there be a light at the end of the tunnel? Yes!
I am planning on starting a bible story (or bible theme, such as Creation, which is more than one story) a week. There are 182 stories included in the wonderful included guide which has a retelling of the stories and lists what felt pieces are needed for each story. But of course, you can tell more stories than than if something isn’t included that you want to focus on.
And an example of inside of the book:
I have decided to organize in this way:
- I rough cut everything and organized according to the TINY numbers on each felt piece
- The back of the guide has a detailed list of each item and its corresponding number. I made labels and put them on each of my envelopes so things are easier to find. (Betty Lukens does sell an organizer for $40, but I like using my system for other homeschooling materials, so I decided to keep with a system that I like.)
- I organized using Target’s Up and Up brand of snap envelopes (they can hold 9×12 pages) and put all my envelopes in a square canvas bin (also from Target)
- Each Sunday, I will only have to cut out 10-20 pieces for that week’s story — I will try to have two or three done in advance so there aren’t any cutting emergencies.
To my husband: No, I am not crazy. Our children will grow in their knowledge of the Bible and the Lord through wonderfully illustrated and vibrantly colored stories! I can’t wait to get started!
Update: I made some labels for the Betty Lukens Bible Felt Set, if you are in need of organizing yours :)
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You can download the Betty Lukens Felt Labels here.
You are most definitely not crazy. I grew up with a Bible felt set like this and LOVED it.
Haha, thanks Maryanne, we started with creation this week and my son loves it…. and my husband is seeing the benefit… he just can’t believe all the cutting I am doing :)
Love this Amy! I think I might look into getting this. I am in charge of our church nursery and we need some Bible materials! We are a church plant so currently we have no children’s ministry budget, but I’m thinking if I just buy these for us than I could use them on Sunday mornings as well!
xo :)
I love how you have the felt pieces organized! My mother-in-law, who is a director with CEF, let me borrow her entire Betty Lukins set to teach my 2YO and 3YO, but all the pieces are just jumbled in a carrying case. I would love to organize them for her (as well as for me ;-) ). How many envelopes did you need and what categories did you put on your labels?
Hi, Barbara! I will get you the labels later today — they are in my napping daughter’s room — I’m so glad you like my organization!
Have you had a chance to get that label list yet? I am a bit overwhelmed by how the pieces in my MIL’s set are just thrown into the case and really need to sort them before I can use them. Your labels will be sooo helpful! Again, thank you for sharing this!
Barbara, I just sent you the email with a pdf of my labels — I’m so sorry it took me so long — I hope you can get it together :) Do you have the book? That will make everything make much more sense!
Thank you so much for sending it! This is awesome. I think my MIL will be surprised when I eventually return them.
Dear Amy! THANK YOU for this!! I bought my Betty Lukens set over a year ago and have tried 5 different ways of organizing it, none of them made things super easy to find. I LOVE what you did and have been looking online for those folders.
Did you buy the Target Up and Up VERTICLE EXPANDING snap envelopes, or just the NORMAL snap envelopes. Should I get the verticle ones or the horizontal ones if I put them in a similar fabric drawer?? I might label mine according without numbers like “men standing, men kneeling, women, children, weapons, etc”… what do you think? Am I making things more complicated?
Sorry for all the detail, I’m just excited to have found you! =) Thank you for taking the time to read this!
Rebecca
Hi, Rebecca, If you have the manual, I’d organize by numbers because then it’d be easier to find who you’re looking for. When you’re at Target, you’ll be able to fit the snap envelopes in to make sure that they fit. Mine are just the normal ones (not expanding). Glad I could help you!! Good luck!!
Hello, Rebecca.
Thanks for all of your ideas here. I have a question before we begin our cutting experience!
Are many of the pieces repeated in more than one story? I was wondering if it would be easier to make a separate envelope for each story. But, then, we would have 182 envelopes.
Thanks for your advise,
Amy
I thought about doing that, but yes, many of the people and scenery are repeated. You *could* put all the specialty ones in envelopes (ark for Noah, etc) but I tend to put about 5 stories together ata time — but I’m using a lot of the same trees for the stories. It gets hard and tedious to be honest!!!
Hi Amy! I am new to your site. Found it by searching Google with “how to sort bible felt pieces by groups of stories”. I’m so glad I found you! And your free printable Betty Lukens labels will be a huge help.
My daughter is a missionary overseas & our church is sending her a set. The ladies just divided up the figures just like your labels but did not number them. Since the churches in the country she is at has a Sunday school lending library, the felt has to be sorted out by groups of Bible stories, for example, Moses, Abraham, The life of Jesus, Patriarchs etc. Of course you run into the problem of not having enough figures, for example Moses. So she said you you only get 1 Moses that’s all you get. So each group of stories would not have every single piece ( they make due with what they have)
I’m looking to find someone who has already done that & has a list of each piece number that they used per group of stories. When one of our ladies divided the stories in the table of contents she got 18. If we ever get this figured out and can have a list of the pieces used per group of stories I will try contact you so you can post it on your site. Once this can be done, it will save so much time for those of us that love Betty Lukens Bible Felt.
There are many missionaries overseas using the Betty Lukens Bible Felt.
Thanks :)
Thank you Raquel! That would be fantastic, and I’d love to post it :) Blessings to you and yours.
You’ve owned these felts for a good while now. I’m very interested in buying the small deluxe set. I’m just curious if you think it was worth it. Did you finish cutting the pieces out? Any tips to make the process easier? A lot of reviews talk about how tedious it is to cut the set out. I’m thinking if I got them I may have to give myself 6 months or more prep time before I start teaching from them for our daily devotional because of limited time to get them ready. (I have 7 children and we homeschool).
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Hi, Amy! I am a Blossom and came across your post when I was searching the internet for reviews on this set. I thought, “Hey, I know her!” :) Thanks for sharing!
That’s so funny :) :) <3
I used the Betty Lukens Bible flannel graph on a mission trip to India and it was a huge hit…..it could be used in the slums where there was no power, and the bright colours made it very appealing in the dungy, dirty surroundings. I mounted the background felt on an outside wall and conducted on outreach Gospel lesson – I saw dozens of people come up to hear the Bible stories. I then donated the whole deluxe felt set to an orphanage in Cuttuck, Odisha where the Dalit children are sold into slavery – the orphanage is protecting the children from slavery and the Betty Lukens Bible flannel graph is used twice a week to conduct Bible lessons for the Dalit children. It’s a wonderful resource for mission trips!….regards, Neil.
Pictures of the mission lessons are at:
http://www.users.on.net/~mec/evangelical/missions/september/28.JPG
http://www.users.on.net/~mec/evangelical/missions/september/26a.png
http://www.users.on.net/~mec/evangelical/missions/september/30.JPG
http://www.users.on.net/~mec/evangelical/missions/september/26.JPG
http://www.users.on.net/~mec/evangelical/missions/september/27.JPG
http://www.users.on.net/~mec/evangelical/missions/september/29.JPG
Thank you for sharing Neil! How wonderful.
That is a great story. I love seeing the pictures. Thanks for sharing!
I found your article because I was desperately searching for a better way to organize this mess of felt! I am so frustrated that Betty Lukens makes this whole process so difficult and the “organizing file system” is nothing but a cardboard box that only holds 2/3 of the items! I am on the hunt for a rigid plastic case for everything. How have you stored your felt boards? I really want something sealed from dust and dirt. I am also frustrated at myself because I have had the set (my mom cut them for me!) for 3 months and haven’t used them once because I am afraid that they will become disorganized and messy if I dont have a good system first. Have you udpated your system at all? Do you still find it easy to use? How do you store the boards?
I am so thankful I found this!!!!! I teach preschool at a christian school and just ended up throwing in the towel on this set last year after spending countless hours cutting felt!!!!!! I have the large set and the boxes are HUGE, creating a storage issue in my classroom. I was thinking about filing them per bible story (like you, I combine many of the Betty Lukens stories into one, larger bible story – Creation, Noah’s ark, etc.) but the way you have done it here is WAY better!!!!!! What a fantastic idea. The Lord lead me right to your site through Pinterest because I was starting to feel overwhelmed with sorting all those felt things AGAIN just to have them fall to the bottom of the box if they are not perfectly flat at all times!!!!!! Thank you so much for the labels and post!!!!!!
I’m contemplating buying the deluxe set. Do the multitude of pieces make it too overwhelming to use regularly? How long does it take to dig out pieces for 1 story?
Yes, BUT I am trying to find a better way to organize them! And I think I found found it! I need to be able to store these in a smaller space and the original large boxes and sheets are making it it very difficult. I LOVE the large set and using it with my students it’s so worth the extra effort to use them. Now I think I can find a much easier way to use them each week!