Baby Blankets

I've been meaning to get some sewing projects finished for a while but just haven't had the time. Since Daniel has been gone all this week I thought it would be a perfect time to lug the sewing machine out and get to work since I could just set it up on Daniel's nightstand. That way I wouldn't have to put it away everyday just to keep Stephen away from it.

I had a plan to make some swaddle blankets for the new baby. I bought a nice soft flannel sheet at DI for a $1 and thought it would make some really soft blankets. We have a lot of receiving blankets but they are kinda small when it comes to swaddling. So I wanted to make 4 blankets that were a generous 45"x45".

My first problem was trying to cut them out. I didn't have a place large enough to spread the sheet out (king size) and I was not relishing the thought of having to mark it all off, etc. Then I realized that the tile in our kitchen was a decent grid ;) So I hurry and gave it a good mopping. It worked rather well - I only had to do some minor snipping touchups.

I tried out some different edges for each of the blankets. I wanted to make them more unisex just in case we have a girl in a few years. When I finished the red one Stephen wanted to be wrapped up in it and so tried the new blanket out.

Stephen's a bit too long of course but other than that it worked really well. I told him to pretend he was sleeping like a baby so that's what he's doing in the picture on the right.

They are all finished except one (the last one on the right). I gave it a foldover finished edge but nothing fancy because I'm going to try a navy blue crocheted edge on it instead. I figured it would be a good project for General Conference next weekend.

We ended up with 4 really soft blankets and matching burp cloths for pretty cheap since the material for each set was only $.25! Gotta love DI.

The other project I did was much simpler. The one type of blanket I wished I had with Stephen was a large blanket I could take with me to the park or the church or friend's houses that was big enough to spread on the floor for him to roll around on and play on. Something with a cute pattern to keep him interested when he was on his tummy, etc. Anyway, since we have lots of receiving blankets I took 4 of them (that were the exact same fabric) and stitched them together to make one big blanket. It seems to be just the right size too.
I have been wanting to make something for this baby for a long time. I was working full time right up until the day Stephen was born and so I didn't have the opportunity to make anything special for him. I have always felt bad about that. Luckily we were blessed to have loving friends and family who gave us many gifts and made sure we had everything we needed to make sure Stephen was always very comfortable. This next baby will continue to benefit from all that generosity but I am glad I've had time to make some special things just for him so it's not all hand-me-downs ;)