Burp Cloths!

When I had our first son, I would receive these very thin, very light weight burp cloths as gifts. I personally was looking at them thinking, "these would be great for the bath, but I doubt they will catch any spit up". So, then I did a little research online, and found a few different ideas. One was to take a cloth diaper by Gerber and add cute fabric to it, and then you use that. Well, its cute, but if you actually look at the Gerber cloth diapers, it only has batting in the center. So, your child better have awesome aim! Okay, so that was cute, but not practical enough for me.
     On to another idea.
Saw one that was a square with flannel on each side, and it was okay size, looked like it might work. However, when you put something square on your shoulder, it has a tendency to fall off, it just doesn't sit well. I also later found out (when I had my son) flannel does not catch much. I had spit up running OFF the flannel.
     So, that was a no go.
Then I saw this blog, where she made curved burp cloths, and it had TERRY CLOTH on one side!! Brilliant! Towels absorb heat, wetness, they clean up spills, and we use them in everyday life! Okay so I had to try this burp cloth.

The design was simple:

Pattern, that I designed from something I saw online.

I just modified the design I saw, by making it wider in the round area, and slightly longer in the center. This helped catch more, and also sit better on my shoulder. Now if you make this kind of burp cloth I suggest make a few different patterns, some long, some short, etc. Or you can even measure your shoulder and where you would want the most coverage.

The burp cloth on my shoulder, sitting perfectly in place!

They work well under the little ones while playing!

Also great for bottle fed babies! Tucks right under the chin!

Now, with my first like I said, I made a few, tried a few, and when he came along we were digging through the dryer everyday for the handful of burp cloths I had made with the terry cloth! We loved them! So, then I spent a full 2 nights, after our little guy was asleep; making a ton! I think in all I made somewhere between 30-40 burp cloths! Our first son was formula fed, and for some reason loved to spit up. We were constantly catching spit up multiple times a day, and we were using about 6-10 burp cloths a day. With 30-40 burps cloths we were doing laundry at least twice a week, just for the burp cloths! We had back up ones, that we could careless for, but they were our "crap we need to do laundry" ones!

I believe this was a 1/3 of the burp cloths we had!

I love the ones I made SO much, I began making them for gifts. Then I started getting requests from other people to make them! So, here my collection of burp cloths over the past few months and years!

Made these for my first son, have about 3 times this amount now!

I then made a few as gifts:

I up-cycled old receiving blankets that never got used, and made them into neutral burp cloths.

These were for a lovely little boy!

And these were for a very adorable baby girl!

I then had several requests from people in the area; however, only one person fell through and I got to make some seriously fun boy themed burp cloths:

Thomas the Train and Air Force fabric!

This was 16 burp cloths total!

Applique on burp cloths, polka dot green.

Turtle and flannel yellow.

Red and blue stars.

I love making burp cloths and the ones I make vs. the ones others make, I have found, mine absorb better! Now, the tutorial on this is super easy. Make sure to make your pattern (like I did), and then you can do it two different ways. You can fold the fabric at the center of the pattern or lay it flat. I am going to do the tutorial with it flat, as I am already making multiples in this tutorial. Heres the tutorial.

 Place your pattern on the WRONG side of the fabric, and trace it with a washable fabric marker.

 Then cut, with scissors (unless your a pro with a rotary cutter) along the edge of the marker.

 Now you have your main fabric cut out as the pattern... now continue with each layer!

 Next, trace the pattern onto you terry cloth.

 As you can see I was making several, and my terry cloth is folded so I was cutting two layers at a time.

 Cut out your terry cloth pattern.

 Continue again, tracing your pattern on to a batting. Now, I use a thin, cotton based batting. I prefer an organic, cotton batting as its thin, but still tends to absorb a lot. You DO NOT have to add batting to your burp cloth as I have a few (from those trial runs), that do not have batting and they work just fine! Terry cloth is very absorbent!

 Again, I'm cutting several out, so here are several of the pattern traced onto my batting (again folded, so I can cut two at a time).

 Here is the batting all cut out in the pattern.

 Now your going to layer the 3 fabrics/batting. First lay your cotton (or patterned) fabric down with the RIGHT side of the fabric facing UP! Then place the terry cloth RIGHT side down (so now the two right sides are facing each other). NOTE: my terry cloth doesn't have a right side, however; some cheaper kinds do! So, make sure you know which side you want to use. Lastly place the batting on top on the terry cloth.

 Go around the edge of the three layers of fabric and PIN then together.

 I have a serger, so I continue off to the serger, and serge the entire edge of the burp cloth, leaving about a one and a half inch to a two inch hole open. NOTE: if you do NOT have a serger don't worry you can do a straight stitch about 1/4 inch in from the edge, leaving a 1 1/2 - 2 inch hole. Then switch over to your zig-zag stitch and stitch on the right side of the straight stitch that you just did. The zig-zag stitch will help hold all three pieces of fabric together when you flip them inside out.

 Notice my serged edge and my hole that I am leaving.

 Here is my hole that I have left. This hole is closer to 1 1/2 inches.

 Now, flip the fabrics inside out. This is where you need to pay attention. When you flip the fabric, flip between the cotton/designed fabric and the terry cloth. The terry cloth and batting should flip together, pushing the batting to the inside and placing the cotton/design fabric and terry cloth to the outside of your pattern!

 TA-DA!!! Now you have your burp cloth inside-out! Head over to the ironing board, as you might see its kind of wrinkled and needs a nice press. I now iron the burp cloth, pushing those seams out and making a nice crisp curved edge.

 Now your going to need to push the cotton and terry cloth fabric to the inside of the burp cloth to make a nice flat edge. Just make sure that the terry cloth and cotton/design fabric line up with each other as well as the rest of the burp cloth around the edge. Try not to get any folding in the fabric. Once you have it tucked, I run my iron over the tucked fabric to help hold it in place.

 Grab 3 or 4 pins, and pin the hole closed.

 Head over to your regular sewing machine and now we are going to top stitch around the entire top of the burp cloth. NOTE: in the above photo, I am starting about a 1/2 inch from the hole. I begin with a lock in stitch, and then carefully top stitch over the hole, and make sure your catching both the terry cloth and cotton/design fabric to seal that hole shut! I typically top stitch about 1/8 of an inch from the edge of my burp cloth.

 When I am about to complete my top stitch I overlap where I started slightly (about an inch) and then do another lock stitch to seal the top stitch off.

 Heres what your edge should look like.

 This is what your finished product should look like! You have done it! Great job, now you have an awesome burp cloth to use, or give as an easy baby gift!

 Heres the folded up burp cloth, so dang cute.

Now you can make 3 or 4 or more, tie them up with ribbon and give them as baby shower gifts. If you have enough energy, you can always make bibs (from this tutorial) to add to your baby shower gift or for your personal use! You could always buy matching vinyl and add a splat mat as well, heres my informational sewing run down on how to make one (over here)!

I hope this tutorial is helpful, and feel free to comment or ask questions so I can edit it if need be!

Have fun burp cloth making,
Sarah

Bibs for Babies!

Ok, yes I know theres tons of bib tutorials and tons of bib ideas all over the web these days, but I thought I would add my tutorial and a few of the bibs I have done.

Bibs are super easy if you ask me, but sometimes when I look at designs, or ideas on pinterest and other blogs I realize some people make them too complicated, when they really don't need to be!

I love making bibs and also love using snaps instead of velcro. If you have followed a few of my other posts you probably already know that my son has figured out the velcro but not the snaps! So, if you don't have a snap device I HIGHLY recommend them. I purchased mine at Joanns. Heres the one I bought! You purchase that device and then you purchase the snaps to go with it, and those look like these!

Now if you have velcro and prefer velcro then please feel free to add that where I have added the snaps! Just be sure to purchase sewing velcro and not the sticky kind!

Heres a few of the more recent bibs I have done:

Neutral themed bib!

Boy themed bibs!

Girl bib!

Girl bib!

Turtle Themed with yellow flannel back.

Turtle Themed bibs with the Yellow flannel back.

Green polka dot with white and yellow flannel back.

I think bibs are a great gift, especially when you make them by hand! These, with a few burp cloths, maybe a taggy, throw in a outfit or a stuffed animal and you have a cute hand made gift!

Alright, heres the bib tutorial:

This is the bib pattern. I made it by tracing a bib i bought, and then adding about a 1/2 inch on all sides (except the folded side).

Note: When your making your pattern you should trace it onto paper and trial run the size. I made a few with scratch fabric I had sitting around and adjusted the size as I went.

 Fold your Fabric the width of your pattern. I do this so I can use as much of the available fabric as possible. Note: the fabric is folded with the two RIGHT sides together.

 Place your bib pattern on the wrong side of the folded fabric. Place the folded part of the pattern on the folded fabric.

 Trace your pattern with a pencil, or washable marker. Then pin the entire area, to ensure it doesn't move while you are cutting it out.

 Cut out the marked pattern, using your fabric scissors. If you are better with a rotary cutter then have at it. When I am working with such a curved pattern i prefer to pin, pin, pin, and cut with scissors.

 Do the exact same this (fold fabric, place pattern, trace, pin, and cut), with a second fabric for the back of the bib. Now, I like to use flannel when I am making bibs. One side it pretty with a design and the other just a simple flannel. I also prefer the flannel on one side to help absorb some of the drool, food, milk, spit up or whatever else it may catch! If you would prefer to do two cottons and place a thin batting in the middle, you can do that as well!

 Now you have your back(s) and your front(s). Here I have made 3 bibs total.

 I move over to my ironing board, and lay the flannel fabric, RIGHT side up, and then place the cotton fabric RIGHT side DOWN! So now with both RIGHT sides together, I iron the 2 pieces together, making them stiff and it helps them cling to each other.

 I then pin, pin, pin around the entire edge. Now you may pin differently depending on how you plan to seem the bib together. I have a serger so I simply pin the fabrics close to the edge just to keep them from moving. Where as, if you are going to straight stitch and then zig-zag stitch around the edge, you might want to have you pins pinning from outside towards the center of the bib.

 I then serge the entire edge, but be sure to leave a small hole, about an inch and a half to two inches wide.

 Heres my hole, its about an inch and a half wide.

 Again you can see my hole, which you will now use to turn the fabric inside out. Note: I serged my edges, if you do not have a serger again you can straight stitch about 1/4 inch in from the edge and then go back around with a zig-zag stitch and finish the 1/4 inch edge, to give it a little more strength.

 Turn your bib inside out by pulling the fabric through the hole you left.

 Once its turned inside out, be sure to push all your seams out and get all the curved edges as far out as they can go. See how wrinkly the fabric is, now thats no good! So back over to your ironing board you go!

 Folding the two fabrics in, where your hole is, and make a seamless line. (As seen below), then iron the folded fabric at the hole and continue to iron the rest of the bib, so it is nice and flat. Note: I iron the cotton side only! I don't want to burp off all that lovely soft flannel, so i simply stick to the cotton sides.

 Note the hole you used to turn the fabric inside out, now is folded inside, and the seams all line up and the bib is smooth.

 After ironing it flat, be sure to pin that hole so those two pieces of fabric don't move on you when you go to top stitch the bib!

 Back over to your regular sewing machine. Now I am just using a simple straight stitch, and my regular sewing foot. Nothing fancy here. If you have trouble straight stitching around corners you can decrease the stitch size and this will help you move smoothly around corners. Note: be sure to practice on a separate scrap fabric when you alter your stitch to make sure your fabric wont scrunch or get stuck, etc.

Now, I like to do a lock stitch before I begin my top stitching. I simply lock stitch, go over the hole we pinned, and then continue all the way around the bib, trying to keep a consistent space from the edge. I do about 1/8 of an inch from the edge. When I come back around to where I started I go about 3-5 stitches over the first few I made, and then end with another lock stitch.

 This is my top stitch around the front (polka dot fabric) and also what it looks like on the back (yellow, flannel).

 Now on to the snaps. Here is my tools and my snaps. I have colored snaps and just some simple white snaps as well. For this project I am going to use the white snaps.

 For one bib you will need 2 backs, and one male and one female snap pieces.

 Using the pointy/sharp tool, puncture a hole through the 4 pieces of fabric, where you would place a snap. If you are unsure of where to do that, a great way to see is by simply using a toy, stuffed animal, child, or a baby doll. I have made several so I simply hold up the two ends, place them together as if I was going to snap them together and overlap the two fabric ends. I make sure i have enough room on each side, and slide my puncture tool into the 4 fabrics.

 I then place the back and male (cotton side) on one end of the bib, and the back (cotton side) and female on the other end.

 You are now done! You have finished your bib! Be sure to always double check your snaps, to make sure you placed them on correctly. If you choose to just sew on some velcro, be sure to place the male velcro on the cotton side on one end and then the female on the flannel side on the other end (male/female can be swapped, just trying to give you an idea of what to do). You can purchase circles, or an entire roll, and just cut some squares out and stitch those down. If you want you can use a blanket stitch, a zig-zag stitch or just a straight stitch. If you use the straight stitch i would recommend you go around the outside edge of the square (or circle), and then continue with an X shape in the center. That way it will be a little stronger!

 Heres the bib with the snaps connected!

And heres the 3 bibs all done, one with the backside facing up so you have an idea of what it looks like!

I hope this tutorial was handy, and if you would like any further information be sure to leave a comment and ill try my best to help you out!

Happy Bib Making,
Sarah