Baby gifts

My mom and I braved the crowds the day after thanksgiving, and she put up with me despite my bad mood (My toes should have been in the sands of Mexico but our trip was cancelled) for hours at Joannes.  The had a killer sale on flannel.  I had recently been to a baby shower and learned that receiving blankets are a necessity and expected mother's like them.  I also know that my sister-in-law uses them a lot.  I purchased a tone of flannel despite never having made any receiving blankets and without knowing how much I needed.  I came home and dumped my huge bags and took a nap.  Re-energized I spent some time on the Internet finding out what I should do.  After some trail and error and after returning to Joannes and talking with the lady at the cut counter I made my first receiving blanket.  I had left over fabric and had seen some info on burp clothes while on the Internet and decided to make matching ones.  I don't have a picture of my first project but these are the 2nd and 3rd ones for my husbands cousins little boy.  The burp clothes are supper cute once you wash them again, the fray looks really cute.  Unfortunately, my mom & I were finishing these an hour before we were supposed to leave so they did not get washed again.  I plan to make more and will post as I do.  I would also like to embroider on them, but I need more practice.

There is no pattern for the blanket, as I got the instructions from the nice lady that works at the local Joann's.  The suggestion I found were to pre-wash the material, others said you did not have to,  if you wash use lots of conditioner so it is really soft.   1) cut two pieces of fabric (front-pattern & back-plain), total size about 30x42. 2) used a CD to round the corners 3) sewed around (right sides together) leaving and opening to turn, 4) top stitched around making sure to close the opening 5) iron & top stich in the center to hold blanket together 6) fold all pretty

Thanks to my mom for  all her help with this and for always being so patient with me.

For the burp clothes I found this great blog with a pattern.  I lengthened it a bit in the middle because of the amount of fabric I had. Thanks Jill @

http://homemadebyjill.blogspot.com/2008/01/burp-cloth-tutorial.html

My mom had such a cute way of folding these.