Tag Blanket

After not posting for...forever, I've decided to post about tag blankets.

Tag blankets are simply blankets made for babies with tags sewn all around the edges. For some reason, babies are fascinated by tags, so this is actually a really good idea. The part I have an objection to is how expensive tag blankets are. I also found it odd that I couldn't find directions for making these blankets anywhere on the 'net. Maybe I wasn't looking in the right place, or perhaps typing the wrong words into the search engine. In any case, I decided to try and figure it out myself, and after I'm finished writing about it, there'll be one more how-to tag blanket page on the WWW.

I started by cutting out two squares of coordinating flannel. I used a rotary cutter and mat. These squares are 9"x9". It was an arbitrary measurement; mainly I wanted something small to work with for my first experiment.



I then gathered up a bunch of different fabric ribbons and cut them into 4"-long pieces.



I folded all the ribbon pieces in half and arranged them on the right side of one of the squares of flannel. I used an iron (set to "polyester" since that's what the ribbons were made of) to help keep the ribbons folded.



Then, without pinning anything, I serged all the edges very carefully. This was a slow process and required removal of the ribbons while I worked one edge at a time. It helped to mark where the ribbons had to go with a chalk pencil (not shown).



If you look carefully at the right side of the serging, you'll notice it looks different from the other three sides. That's because my serger decided to vomit all over the last edge. I had to rethread all four threads before continuing with the next step. The good thing is, it doesn't really interfere with the functionality of the blanket.

Okay, moving on... Not shown is the part where I serge all four edges of the turquoise square so that I don't end up with frayed edges inside the blanket.

After I did that, I laid the turquoise square on top of the right side of the ribboned yellow flannel, pinned, and sewed all around except for one corner.

I used that unsewed corner to turn the blanket inside out. I then ironed it flat, folded the corner inside carefully, and topstitched all the way around.

Here's what it looks like finished:



And the back:



Notice that one corner looked like it's been lopped off. It hasn't; it's just been folded inside for the final topstitching.

All in all, it's a very easy project and can be completed in about an hour.

Okay, one more thing before I go... Please check out "Steve - Don't Eat It!" It's a link under "Blogs I read" on the left. Made me almost hyperventilate with laughter.