Unit 3: Layettes and Baby Sewing

What a Layette Holds: Counting the Cost Before You Cut

A layette is the bundle of clothing and bedding that carries a baby through the first weeks of life. The word comes from the French for a small box, and that is a fair picture of it: not a wardrobe, but a modest set of plain things, each one washed often and worn hard. Before a single piece of fabric is cut, it is worth sitting down with a pencil and settling exactly what will go in the box.

The working list

A serviceable newborn layette runs about like this: three to five bodysuits that snap along the inseam so a diaper can be changed without undressing the child; two or three sleepers or footed pajamas; two or three pairs of pants, some footed and some not; three or four pairs of socks or booties; several receiving blankets finished at 30 by 40 inches; and at least two fitted crib sheets. Add two or three bibs and a stack of burp cloths and you have covered a newborn's real needs.

Notice how short the list is. Babies outgrow clothing in weeks, and a family with six bodysuits and a working washing machine is better served than a family with twenty. If you are sewing a layette as a gift, restraint is a kindness. A young mother with a small closet does not want to store what she cannot use before it is too small.

Counting yardage before you shop

Work the numbers on paper. A 30 by 40 inch receiving blanket, hemmed on all four sides, wants a cut rectangle of about 32 by 42 inches. Flannel is usually sold 42 to 44 inches wide, so one blanket takes roughly one and a quarter yards, and the loom width covers the 32 inch dimension with a little to spare.

A fitted crib sheet is the piece that surprises people. A standard American crib mattress is about 28 by 52 inches and no more than 6 inches thick, and once you allow for the sides, the tuck under the mattress, and a casing, the cut rectangle runs near 48 by 72 inches. That will not come out of 44 inch goods at any price. Buy 60 inch wide knit and plan on two yards per sheet.

A newborn bodysuit is small enough that half a yard of 60 inch cotton jersey will yield one comfortably, with the sleeves and neckband nested into the leftovers. Buy a little extra rather than a little less; dye lots change, and a shop rarely has your exact color again in three weeks.

What to sew and what to buy

Sew the flat, forgiving pieces and the garments that fit loosely: blankets, sheets, burp cloths, bibs, bodysuits, simple pants, nightgowns. Buy the socks. Socks are knit in the round on machines no home sewer owns, they cost little, and hand-sewn substitutes rarely stay on a wriggling foot.

Order the work so early success carries you. Cut and hem the blankets first. They are rectangles, they teach you how the fabric behaves under your presser foot, and finishing three of them in an evening builds the nerve to cut into knit for a bodysuit.

The cost that is not money

Our Lord asked who would begin a tower without first sitting down to reckon whether he could finish it. He was speaking of discipleship, not sewing, but the principle reaches down into ordinary work. Half a layette is not half a gift. A stack of cut pieces in a bag, meant to be finished someday, blesses nobody.

So count the cost honestly at the start: the yardage, the thread, the snaps, and the hours you actually have. Then plan a bundle you will finish. Three well-made blankets and two bodysuits, delivered warm and washed to a family who needs them, are worth more than an ambitious list that dies in a closet. Write the list down, price it, and hold yourself to it.

Fabric Against a Newborn's Skin: Choosing, Testing, and Prewashing

Everything you sew for an infant will be worn against skin that is thinner and more easily irritated than yours, and it will be laundered two or three times a week for months. Fabric choice and fabric preparation are therefore not preliminaries. They are half the quality of the finished garment.

The four fabrics that do the work

Cotton jersey is the single-knit fabric of ordinary T-shirts. It stretches noticeably across the width, hardly at all along the length, and its cut edges curl toward the right side. It is the standard for bodysuits and infant tees.

Cotton interlock is a double knit, smooth on both faces, thicker and more stable than jersey, and it does not curl at the edges. Beginners often find it easier to handle, and it makes an excellent sleeper or crib sheet.

Cotton flannel is a plain woven cloth brushed on one or both sides to raise a soft nap. It is the classic receiving blanket cloth. It has no useful stretch and it sheds lint heavily in the first few washes.

Cotton muslin and double gauze are lightweight open weaves. Double gauze is two fine layers tacked together at intervals; it drapes beautifully, breathes in hot weather, and makes the large swaddling blankets many mothers prefer.

For skin contact, favor fabric that is all cotton or nearly so. Polyester is strong and dries fast, but it moves moisture differently and a fully synthetic bodysuit can leave a baby clammy. Where you do use a blend, keep the cotton content high.

Test the fabric before you trust it

Run three quick tests on any yardage before you commit to it, especially secondhand cloth or an unfamiliar shop.

Hold a single layer to a window. If you can read print through a knit meant for a bodysuit, it is too light and will show every diaper edge and go transparent when wet.

Stretch a four inch section across the width and let go. Good jersey springs back to its original length. If it stays stretched, the fabric will bag at the knees and the neckband will never recover.

Wet a scrap of any strongly dyed fabric, especially deep red, navy, or black, and press it between two pieces of white cotton. Color on the white means the dye is not fast and will bleed onto everything else in the load. Reject it for baby goods.

Prewashing, and why it is not optional

Wash and dry every piece of fabric before cutting, in exactly the way the finished item will be laundered: warm or hot water, ordinary gentle detergent, machine dried. Cotton knits and flannels shrink, and they shrink more in length than in width. Cut before that happens and your carefully fitted bodysuit becomes a size smaller than intended, with puckered seams where thread that did not shrink is holding cloth that did.

Flannel deserves two trips through the wash. The first pass sheds the loose fibers left from brushing, and it will fill your lint trap; the second pass settles the cloth. Clean the trap between loads.

Prewash the trims too. Ribbing, elastic, and cotton twill tape shrink at their own rates, and a preshrunk garment finished with an unwashed neckband will draw up strangely the first time it is laundered.

Patience at the front end

Solomon set the thoughts of the diligent against the haste that ends in want. Nowhere in sewing is that plainer than here. Skipping the prewash saves an evening and costs a garment. Trusting a bargain fabric that bleeds costs a whole load of clothing.

Do the slow things first: buy carefully, test honestly, wash and dry, press flat, then cut. The diligence you spend before the rotary cutter ever touches the cloth is the diligence nobody sees and everybody wears.

Needles, Thread, and the Stitches That Move With a Baby

A knit garment fails at the seam. Sew a jersey bodysuit with an ordinary straight stitch and the first time the neck is pulled over a head you will hear the thread pop, one stitch after another, like a small zipper opening. The remedy is not stronger thread. It is a seam that can lengthen when the cloth lengthens.

The needle is the first decision

A universal needle has a slightly rounded point that pierces woven cloth cleanly. Pushed through a knit, it will sometimes split a loop instead of sliding between loops, and a split loop becomes a run or a skipped stitch.

Use a ballpoint or jersey needle for knits. Its tip is rounded enough to nudge the loops aside. Size 70/10 or 75/11 suits fine cotton jersey; 80/12 handles interlock and heavier knits. A stretch needle, which has a deeper scarf and a specially shaped eye, is the answer when a ballpoint still skips stitches, as it sometimes does on very stretchy fabric.

For flannel, muslin, and other wovens, a universal 80/12 is right. Change the needle after roughly eight to ten hours of sewing. A dull needle announces itself by skipped stitches, a thumping sound as it enters the cloth, and shredded thread.

Thread, and why polyester wins here

All-purpose polyester thread has a small amount of give in it, which is exactly what a knit seam needs. Cotton thread has almost none; in a stretch seam it becomes the limiting factor and snaps. Use a good polyester all-purpose thread top and bobbin for baby knits, and keep 50 weight cotton for piecing quilt tops where nothing has to stretch.

Three seams that stretch

Narrow zigzag. Set the width to about 0.5 to 1 mm and the length to 2.5 mm. The result reads almost as a straight line but has enough lateral travel to survive stretching. This is the workhorse seam on a home machine.

Three step zigzag. The machine takes three small stitches in each direction of the zigzag. Set it around 1.5 mm wide and 1 mm long. It is excellent over elastic and on necklines that take real strain.

Overlock or serged seam. A serger trims and wraps the edge in one pass, producing the flat, soft seam found in commercial baby clothes. If you have one, use a three thread overlock for baby knits. If you do not, a narrow zigzag followed by a second zigzag near the cut edge does honest duty.

Whatever seam you choose, press it toward the back or to one side, and keep the bulk away from where a baby lies down. On woven garments a French seam encloses the raw edges entirely so nothing rough touches skin.

When the seam comes out wavy

A stretched, rippling seam is the most common trouble in knit sewing, and the cause is almost always feeding. The presser foot pushes the top layer forward while the feed dogs move the bottom layer, and the fabric arrives at the needle already stretched.

Fix it in this order. Reduce the presser foot pressure if your machine allows it. Fit a walking foot so both layers advance together. Support the weight of the garment so it is not hanging off the table and dragging the seam long. Guide the fabric, but never pull it through; your hands should steady, not stretch.

If stitches are skipping, the needle is the suspect: wrong type, wrong size, dull, or inserted a hair short of fully seated. If the seam tunnels into a ridge, loosen the top tension slightly.

Small work, not small worth

The prophet asked who had despised the day of small things, and the answer, then and now, is a great many people. A newborn's sleeve seam is four inches long. It will not be admired. It will be spit upon, laundered ninety times, and thrown away inside of a year.

Sew it well anyway. The mother handling that garment at two in the morning is the one who benefits from a seam that lies flat and does not scratch. Small work done carefully for someone who cannot thank you is the very thing Scripture refuses to despise.

Receiving Blankets and Swaddling Cloths

A receiving blanket is the most used object in a layette. It catches spit, lines a car seat, shades a face, dries a bath, and wraps a baby snug enough to keep his own startled arms from waking him. It is also a rectangle of cloth with four hems, which makes it the best possible first project in baby sewing.

Two blankets, two purposes

The receiving blanket finishes at 30 by 40 inches in single layer flannel. It is small enough to handle one-handed and thick enough to be warm. Cut it 32 by 42 inches to allow a half inch double fold hem on every side.

The swaddling blanket is larger and thinner, commonly 44 or 47 inches square in muslin or double gauze. The size matters: a wrap that is too small will not hold, because swaddling depends on a long diagonal of cloth crossing the chest and tucking under the baby's own weight. Double gauze is often sold about 47 inches wide, so a square swaddle can be cut across the full width with only the two cut ends needing hems.

Cutting a true rectangle

Flannel and gauze both shift under the hand, and a blanket cut crooked shows it forever. Straighten the grain first: snip the selvage and tear the flannel across the width, or pull a single crosswise thread and cut along the channel it leaves. The torn or drawn line is the true grain, and everything else measures from it.

Fold the fabric in half, line up the torn edges, and cut with a rotary cutter against a long ruler on a mat. Keep the fingers of your steadying hand well behind the blade, and close the guard the moment the cut ends. A rotary cutter left open on a table beside a curious child is a hospital visit waiting to happen; make closing it a reflex, not a decision.

Hemming with mitered corners

A double fold hem hides every raw edge, which is what you want against skin. Press a half inch to the wrong side all around, then press another half inch, so the cut edge is buried.

The corners are what separate a homemade blanket from a well made one. Before the second fold, open the pressed hem at one corner. Fold the corner in diagonally so the crease crosses the point where the two hem fold lines intersect, and press. Trim the folded triangle to about a quarter inch. Now refold both hems; they will meet at a clean 45 degree line with no lump underneath. Do all four corners before you sew a stitch.

Stitch about an eighth of an inch from the inner folded edge, with a universal 80/12 needle and a stitch length of 3 mm. The longer stitch suits the thickness of flannel and looks deliberate. Pivot with the needle down at each corner.

Two common failures: hems that wander because the fabric was never pressed, and corners that bunch because the diagonal fold was not trimmed. Both are pressing problems, not sewing problems.

Serged and self bound alternatives

If you own a serger, a narrow rolled hem in matching thread finishes a gauze swaddle beautifully in one pass around the blanket. On flannel, a two layer blanket can be self bound: cut the backing two inches larger on every side, center the top on it wrong sides together, then fold the backing edge over twice onto the front and topstitch. The frame of contrasting flannel is handsome and takes no separate binding.

The cloth that wrapped the Lord

Luke records without ornament that Mary wrapped her firstborn in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger. It is a small domestic detail set in the middle of the greatest event in history, and it tells us something plain: the first thing done for the Son of God on earth was that somebody wrapped him properly in cloth.

That is the whole dignity of this work. Wrapping a baby well is not beneath notice. When you tear a straight edge, press a true corner, and give a young family a stack of soft blankets, you are doing a thing that Scripture thought worth writing down.

Binding a Blanket Edge: Bias, Borders, and Corners That Lie Flat

A hem is the plain finish for a blanket. A binding is the handsome one. A strip of contrasting cloth wrapped around the edge adds a visible border, protects the part of a blanket that wears first, and gives a heavy or bulky quilt something to hold its edge together. It is also where careless work shows most, because the border frames everything inside it.

Straight grain or bias

Cut binding on the straight grain, lengthwise or crosswise, when every corner is a square 90 degree corner. Straight grain strips have almost no stretch, which makes them stable and easy to apply, and they use fabric economically.

Cut binding on the bias, at 45 degrees to the grain, when the edge curves at all: a rounded blanket corner, a bib neckline, a curved hood. Bias stretches and eases around a curve without pleating up. Bias also wears longer, because the abrasion falls across many threads instead of along one.

For a blanket, cut strips 2.25 to 2.5 inches wide. Folded in half lengthwise and applied with a quarter inch seam, that yields a finished border of roughly half an inch on each face.

Joining strips without lumps

Never join binding strips with a straight crosswise seam. All the bulk of both seam allowances lands in one place and makes a hard ridge you can feel through the finished border.

Instead, lay two strips right sides together at a right angle, overlapping the ends in a square. Draw a line from corner to corner across the square, stitch on that line, trim to a quarter inch, and press the seam open. The 45 degree diagonal spreads the bulk across an inch or more of border and disappears. Press every join open, never to one side.

Measure the perimeter of your blanket, add about 12 inches for corners and the final join, and piece enough strips to cover it before you begin.

Applying it, and the mitered corner

Press the pieced strip in half lengthwise, wrong sides together. Lay the raw edges of the folded binding against the raw edge of the blanket front, and stitch with a quarter inch seam allowance.

At a corner, stop stitching exactly a quarter inch from the edge and backstitch. Lift the presser foot, fold the binding straight up so it makes a 45 degree diagonal at the corner, then fold it straight back down so the new fold lies flush with the edge you are about to sew. Begin stitching at the top of that fold. That doubled fold becomes the miter, and it forms itself when you turn the binding to the back.

Now bring the folded edge over to the back and secure it. If you are stitching by machine, catch the back with a 3/8 inch seam allowance rather than a quarter inch. That extra eighth of an inch pulls the folded edge just past the first stitching line, so the machine stitching lands on the binding itself and does not run off onto the blanket. Binding sewn at a quarter inch on both faces almost always misses on the back. If you are finishing by hand, a slip stitch every quarter inch is invisible and worth the evening.

What goes wrong

Wavy binding means the strip was stretched as it was applied; guide it, do not pull. A binding that will not lie flat at the corner usually means the stitching did not stop a full quarter inch short. Puckers along a straight run mean the blanket edge was eased in unevenly, which pressing before application prevents.

Borders with a purpose

Israel was told to make fringes on the four quarters of the garment that covered them, a visible border sewn into ordinary clothing as a standing reminder of the commandments of God. The border was not decoration for its own sake; it carried meaning to the edge of the cloth.

A bound blanket edge is a humbler thing, but the instinct is the same. Finish the outside carefully. What frames the work is the first thing another person sees and the last thing that wears out.

Building a Snap-Crotch Bodysuit, Piece by Piece

The snap-crotch bodysuit is the most useful garment in a layette and the first knit project worth attempting. It is five or six pieces, it fits loosely, and the whole thing goes together in an hour once you know the order. The order is the difficult part. Knits are far easier to sew flat than in a tube, and a sewer who closes the side seams too early has made the rest of the work twice as hard.

Cutting

Cut front, back, two sleeves, a neckband, and the leg binding. The greatest stretch of the knit must run around the body, not up and down it, or the garment will sag in length and bind across the chest. On jersey, whose edges curl, lay the piece flat and cut with a rotary cutter rather than lifting it into scissors.

The front piece has a crotch extension that laps over the back, and that overlap carries the snaps. Do not trim it away to save fabric. Transfer the pattern's notches with small clips into the seam allowance, no deeper than an eighth of an inch. Most knit patterns use a 3/8 inch seam allowance; confirm yours before you begin, because a quarter inch habit from quilting will make every piece too large.

The order of assembly

1. Shoulder seams first, sewn flat with the two pieces open on the table.
2. Neckband next, applied while the garment still lies flat and open.
3. Sleeves set in flat, matching the sleeve cap notch to the shoulder seam, before either side seam is closed.
4. Side seams and underarm seams in one pass, from the wrist down the sleeve, pivoting at the underarm, and on down to the leg opening.
5. Leg binding, applied around the leg openings and the crotch curve.
6. Snaps last, once everything else is finished and pressed.

Sew each seam with a ballpoint 75/11 needle, polyester all-purpose thread, and a narrow zigzag about 0.5 to 1 mm wide and 2.5 mm long, or a three thread overlock if you have a serger.

Stabilize the shoulder seams. A shoulder that stretches will keep stretching every time the garment is pulled on. Lay a length of quarter inch clear elastic or narrow twill tape into the seam as you sew it, and the shoulder will hold its measurement for the life of the garment.

Setting the snaps

Use ring-prong snaps, size 16, which is about 3/8 inch across the cap. Three across a newborn crotch, spaced about an inch and a quarter apart, is right.

Prongs need something to grip. Set into a single layer of soft jersey they will pull free, and a snap that pulls free is a choking hazard, not merely a repair. Back each snap position with a small square of knit fusible interfacing, and set the snap through the interfacing and both fabric layers of the finished, bound edge. Always test on a scrap built to the same thickness before you touch the garment.

Caps go on the public side, sockets and studs on the inside. Set them with a proper snap press or hand pliers, seated square, and then take each finished snap between your fingers and pull hard. If any part shifts, remove it and set a new one.

What goes wrong

A neckband that will not pass over a head means the band was cut too short; there is no fixing it but to recut. A wavy sleeve hem means the fabric was pulled through the machine. A crotch that gapes means the front extension was sewn to the back instead of left free to lap over it. Skipped stitches almost always mean a universal needle went in where a ballpoint belonged.

Every piece, in order

Paul told the church at Ephesus to put on the whole armor of God, and then he named the pieces one at a time: girdle, breastplate, shoes, shield, helmet, sword. Nothing was optional and nothing was out of order.

Garment construction rewards the same patience. Skip the shoulder stay and the neck sags in a month. Set the snaps before the binding and they land crooked. Work the pieces in their order, each one prepared before the next depends on it, and the finished garment holds together under real use.

Ribbed Necklines, Cuffs, and the Lap Shoulder

A knit neckline cannot simply be hemmed. Folded and stitched, it stretches out the first time it passes over a head and never returns. The answer is a band: a short strip of stretchy fabric, joined into a ring and stretched to fit a longer opening, so that its natural recovery pulls the neckline back into shape after every use.

Doing the arithmetic

Measure the neckline opening along the stitching line, not the cut edge, by standing a tape measure on its side and walking it around the curve. Call that measurement N.

Cut the band length at 85 percent of N if you are using true ribbing, or 90 percent of N if you are using cotton jersey or interlock, which recover less. Add half an inch to the band length for the quarter inch seam that joins it into a ring.

Cut the band 1.5 inches wide, with the greatest stretch running along its length. Folded in half lengthwise and joined with a quarter inch seam, that finishes at a half inch band, which is right for infant garments.

Before you attach anything, join the band into a ring, fold it, and stretch it open with both hands. A newborn's head measures roughly 13 to 14 inches around. If your band ring will not open past that with ease, it is too short, and no amount of careful sewing will save the garment. Recut now.

Attaching the band

Fold the band ring in half lengthwise, wrong sides together, raw edges even, and press lightly.

Quarter both the band and the neckline. Fold the band flat and mark the two fold points, then the two points halfway between; do the same on the garment neckline, using the shoulder seams and the center front and center back. Pin the four band marks to the four neckline marks, right sides together, raw edges even.

Now sew with a ballpoint 75/11 needle and a narrow zigzag, stretching the band to fill each quarter as you go. Stretch the band only. The garment must stay relaxed under the presser foot, or the neckline itself grows and the whole point is lost. Your left hand holds the pin ahead, your right hand holds the pin behind, and you pull them apart just enough to close the gap.

Press the seam allowance down toward the body of the garment. If you want a professional face, topstitch through the garment and the seam allowance a scant eighth of an inch below the band, with a twin stretch needle or a narrow zigzag.

Cuffs by the same rule

A sleeve cuff or an ankle cuff is the same operation, smaller. Cut the cuff about 85 percent of the sleeve opening and twice the finished width plus two seam allowances. Cuffs are worth adding to infant sleeves for a second reason: a cuff long enough to fold back over the hand covers fingernails that would otherwise scratch a face.

The lap shoulder

Many infant tees avoid the neck problem entirely with a lap shoulder, sometimes called an envelope neck. The front and back shoulders are each finished separately with their own band, then overlapped about one inch, front over back, and basted at the armhole edges before the sleeve goes in.

The overlap lets the garment be pulled down over the body and off the feet, which matters when a baby has been sick and the shirt has to come off without going past his face. It is the kindest neckline you can sew for a newborn.

Bands that carry meaning

Israel was told to put a band of blue on the borders of their garments through all their generations, a visible edge that carried a reminder wherever they went. Borders were understood work, deliberate and specified.

A neckband is humble by comparison, and yet it is the same instinct: the edge is not an afterthought but the place where the garment is most seen, most handled, and most likely to fail. Finish it with intention and the whole garment reads as careful.

Nightgowns and Sleepers: Warmth, Closures, and Room to Grow

A newborn sleeps most of the day and is changed several times a night. Sleepwear is therefore the hardest working part of a layette, and it is judged by two things: how warm it keeps the child, and how fast a tired parent can get into it at three in the morning.

The infant gown

The simplest and most useful piece is the infant gown: a loose knit garment with sleeves and no legs, gathered closed at the bottom with elastic. Nothing is faster to change, because a diaper is reached by lifting the hem instead of opening a row of snaps.

Sew it from cotton interlock or a medium weight jersey. Finish the bottom with a half inch casing and quarter inch braided elastic, cut a few inches shorter than the hem circumference and anchored at both ends with a bar of stitching. The elastic closes the hem enough to hold warmth without gripping the legs.

Never use a drawstring at a hem or a neckline on infant clothing, and never a ribbon or a tie long enough to loop. Elastic in a closed casing does the same work with none of the risk.

Sleepers and their closures

A footed sleeper is warmer and stays on better in a cool room, but it must be opened its full length for changes. A two-way zipper is the friendliest closure: it opens from the bottom for a diaper without exposing the chest. Sew a small fabric tab over the top stop of the zipper so the pull cannot rest against a chin. If you use snaps instead, plan a continuous row from neck to ankle, spaced two to three inches, all set through interfaced double layers.

Feet want a second thought. A single layer of jersey wears through in weeks. Line the sole of a footed sleeper with a second layer of the same knit, or with a scrap of soft cotton, and the sleeper will outlast the baby's growth instead of the other way around.

Safe sleep

Two points of care belong here. First, current guidance is that infants sleep safest on a firm surface with nothing loose in the crib, which is why wearable sleep sacks and well fitted sleepers have largely replaced loose blankets at night. A receiving blanket is a daytime tool.

Second, sleepwear regulations in the United States require children's sleepwear to be either flame resistant or snug fitting, with an exemption for the smallest infant sizes. Home sewers cannot manufacture flame resistant fabric, so sew snug fitting sleepwear from cotton knits, and check the current requirements before selling or donating any garment labeled as sleepwear.

Room to grow

Babies outgrow length before they outgrow width, and they do it in weeks. Build in growth deliberately.

Sew gowns rather than pants where you can; a gown fits over a longer span because nothing depends on inseam length. Choose raglan sleeves, which forgive a growing shoulder better than a set-in sleeve. Cut cuffs long enough to fold back once, so they can be let out later. Leave a two inch hem allowance on sleeve and gown hems, and use elastic waists rather than fitted ones.

Size by measurement, not by the month printed on a pattern envelope. Babies of the same age differ by inches. If you are sewing for a family you cannot measure, sew the next size up; a garment slightly too large is worn for months, and one slightly too small is never worn at all.

The sign given to shepherds

The angel told the shepherds how they would know the child: they would find him wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. The sign was not splendor. It was a baby, clothed carefully, in a poor place.

Sewing warm clothes for a child who cannot notice, at hours when nobody is watching, is work of exactly that kind. It is not glamorous and it is not admired. It is simply what a child needs, done properly, by someone who was willing.

Fitted Crib Sheets and Changing Pad Covers

A fitted sheet is nothing but a rectangle with four corners removed and elastic added, and yet it is the one piece of baby sewing where a careless measurement is genuinely dangerous. A sheet that is too large will pull loose from a corner during the night and lie loose over a sleeping infant. Measure honestly, sew it snug, and the rest is easy.

Measure the mattress yourself

A standard American crib mattress is about 28 by 52 inches and no more than 6 inches thick, but do not take that on faith. Put a tape measure on the actual mattress the sheet is for, and measure the thickness at the middle of a side, where the mattress is not compressed.

Write down three numbers: length L, width W, and depth D.

The cutting formula

Every side of the sheet must reach down the mattress side, tuck underneath, and then have enough left for a casing. Allow D for the side, 3 inches for the tuck, and 1 inch for the casing. Call that total the corner allowance, C.

For a standard mattress, C is 6 plus 3 plus 1, which is 10 inches.

Cut a rectangle measuring L plus twice C by W plus twice C. For a 52 by 28 inch mattress that is 72 by 48 inches. Note the width: 48 inches will not come out of 44 inch goods, so buy 60 inch wide fabric and plan two yards per sheet.

Then cut a square of side C, which is 10 inches, out of each of the four corners. This is where a rotary cutter and a square ruler earn their place; a crooked corner cut makes a sheet that twists on the mattress.

Sewing it

Fold each corner so the two cut edges of the notch meet, right sides together, and sew from the outer edge to the inner point with a half inch seam allowance. Finish that seam with a serger or a zigzag so it will survive weekly laundering. You now have a shallow box.

Around the whole opening, press a quarter inch to the wrong side and then a further half inch, making a casing. Stitch it down close to the inner fold, leaving an opening.

Cotton jersey makes the best crib sheets because the knit itself grips the mattress. Cut it with the stretch running around the sheet. A woven cotton sheet works too and wrinkles less, but it depends entirely on the elastic.

Elastic at the corners

Rather than running elastic around the whole perimeter, run a length of quarter inch braided elastic through the casing across each corner: about 14 inches, centered on the corner seam, anchored at each end with a short bar of stitching through the casing. Four short lengths are easier to thread than one long one, they concentrate the grip where the sheet actually pulls off, and if one wears out you replace one.

Turn the sheet onto the mattress and check the fit with your hands. The corners should require a small tug to seat and should not lift when you pull a side. If a corner slips off, the sheet is too big and the elastic is too long; shorten it.

Changing pad covers

A contoured changing pad cover is the same construction on a smaller scale. Measure the pad's length, width, and depth at the flat center, work the same corner allowance, and cut the same corner squares. Because a changing pad has raised sides, use jersey rather than a woven; the knit follows the contour where a woven bridges across it.

A just measure

Solomon wrote that a false balance is an abomination to the Lord and a just weight is his delight. He was speaking of merchants weighing out grain, but the moral principle rests on something simple: accurate measurement is a form of honesty toward the person on the other side of the transaction.

Nobody will ever check your arithmetic on a crib sheet. The baby who sleeps on it is the one who bears the result. Measure the mattress you are sewing for, not the one in the catalog, and let the numbers be true.

Bibs, Burp Cloths, and Delivering the Finished Bundle

The last pieces of a layette are the smallest, and they are the ones used most. A family runs out of burp cloths long before it runs out of sleepers. These are the projects to make from the good scraps left over from everything else, and they are the projects to hand a beginner in a sewing circle.

Burp cloths

The plainest burp cloth is two rectangles of cotton flannel, about 10 by 18 inches, sewn right sides together with a 3/8 inch seam allowance, leaving a four inch gap along one long side. Clip the corners at an angle so they will turn sharp, turn it right side out, push the corners out with a blunt tool rather than scissors, press the opening's edges to the inside, and topstitch all the way around an eighth of an inch from the edge. The topstitching closes the gap and keeps the layers from shifting in the wash.

Two layers of flannel absorb well and dry fast. Terry cloth absorbs more but is heavier and takes far longer to dry, which matters when a family is doing laundry every day.

Bibs

Cut a bib from two layers: a cotton front and a flannel or terry back. Bind the outside edge and the neck curve with bias binding, which will ease around the curves where straight grain binding would pleat.

Close it at the back of the neck with hook and loop tape or a single snap. Do not use ties. A bib tie long enough to knot is long enough to be a hazard around a neck, and it gains you nothing.

Skip the appliqués, buttons, beads, and anything else small enough to come off and be swallowed. If you want decoration, put it in the printed fabric or in the color of the binding.

The final inspection

Before anything leaves your house, spread all of it on a clean table and go over the whole set piece by piece.

Turn each garment inside out and clip every thread tail. Run your hand along every interior seam, feeling for anything scratchy. Take hold of every snap and pull hard; reset any that shift. Check that no raw edge is left exposed where it will rub. Then wash and dry the whole bundle in an unscented, gentle detergent, both because it softens everything and because it is a final test: anything that was going to shrink, bleed, or come apart will do it in your machine rather than theirs.

Write a small card listing what the fabrics are and how to wash them. A young mother handed a stack of homemade clothing has no idea whether it can go in a hot wash. Telling her costs you two minutes and saves the gift.

Why we do it

Job, defending his life before his accusers, offered as evidence that he had never watched anyone perish for want of clothing or seen the poor without covering. He counted clothing the cold among the plainest duties a righteous man owes his neighbor.

There has always been this thread running through the church. Luke records that the disciples at Joppa wept over a woman named Dorcas and showed the coats and garments she had made while she was with them. Her memorial was a pile of clothing, held up by the widows who were wearing it.

Sewing a layette is a small work in that same line. A young family that cannot afford much receives a bundle of soft, sound, well made things, and receives with them the plain message that somebody thought about them beforehand and spent hours they will never see. Make the small pieces well. Inspect them honestly. Then give the bundle away and do not wait to be thanked.