Chenille Backed Blanket Tutorial

This is a great first project for the begining sewer, and makes a great baby gift.

1. You need to start off with 1 piece of chenille cut 36″x36″ and 1 piece of cotton or flannel cut to 36″x36″.  For this tutorial, my chenille is actually 2 colors of chenille sewn together and cut to the correct size.

2. Line up the pieces, RIGHT sides together and pin to secure around the outside.  Sew with a 1/2″ seam around the entire outside of the square, leaving an 8″ hole in the middle of a side for turning.

The hole for turning:

3. Snip the corners.  Cut near, but not on the threads making up the corner.

 

4. Turn the blanket right side out through the hole.  Iron a nice, crisp crease into the edges.

5. Fold over the raw edges of the open hole ~1/2″, iron and pin the openning closed.  Set aside.

6. Select a decorative stitch to stitch around the outside of the blanket (a zigzag stitch looks nice).  Get some scraps of similar fabric layers to practice the stitch, adjusting length and width until you are satisfied with how it looks.  This is my practice piece:

7. Sew with your decorative stitch all the way around the outside of the blanket, closing up the hole as you go.

8. Snip threads and YOU’RE DONE!

Close up of the decorative stitching:

9. Take a nice picture for your blog.

All rolled up and ready for gifting!

Other options:

Instead of chenille on one side, try flannel for both sides.

Try using pre-peiced cotton on one side for a blanket that looks like a quilt.

Tips:

If using a sheet, you may need to anchor the sheet and chenille together in the center.  This would be the final step of the process.  Some sheets tend to be polished so that they don’t grip the chenille as well as regular cotton fabrics.

See previous post about using a walking foot when sewing with chenille.