My husband and I are putting together the baby room. We’ve got shelves, a bassinet, a comfy chair, a cradle and as of last week, the crib that all four of the children in my family used. It’s a gorgeous maple crib made in Sweden in 1971. My father bought it in England when he was going to school there before my brother was born.

I love being able to use family heirlooms. Our family doesn’t go very far back so means even more to me to keep things that have history.

I soon discovered the downside to this priceless piece of furniture when we tried to find a sheet at Babies R Us. Looks as though the crib mattress (which thankfully is in pristine condition) is an irregular size and stores just don’t carry a fitted sheet in its dimensions.

So let’s sew one! It was pretty easy. The hardest part was cutting, honestly.  Here’s how to make a fitted sheet for your crib mattress.

Materials:
Two yards of 100 per cent cotton fabric (length depending on dimensions of mattress)
36 inches of 1/4-inch wide elastic
Iron

Directions:

Prewash your fabric to make sure it’s preshrunk.

Measure your mattress’ width, length and depth. Ours was 23″x48″x4″. I decided I wanted the sheet to wrap around the mattress by three inches, making the depth of the sheet 7 inches. I didn’t take into account seam allowance and hem, but it seemed to work out just fine for me. You may want to consider adding 3.5 or 4 inches to the depth to compensate.

Since the depth on each side of the sheet will be 7 inches, I added that length to each side of the sheet, or rather, added 14 inches to the width and the length, thus making the dimension of my sheet 37″x62″.

Cut your fabric to the proper dimensions.

Cut 7″x7″ squares out of each corner of the fabric. Discard the cut squares.

Turn under and iron the edges of the sheet. Turn under and iron again so you have no raw edges. Pin and sew hem on all sides.

In the areas you cut out the squares, pin the fabric right sides together where the raw edges still are. Sew each corner. You should now have a somewhat baggy fitted sheet.

Place on the mattress to make sure it’s a good fit. If it’s too baggy, increase the seam allowance of all four corner seams.

Next, cut your elastic into four 9-inch lengths. Find the center of one piece of elastic and line it up with one of the corner seams. Pin or hold in place. While holding or pinning the middle part of the elastic to the hem, stretch the elastic on the right edge as far as it will go and mark where the end of the elastic hits on the inside of the hem. This is where you’ll start sewing the elastic.

Sew elastic in place and backstitch. Now stretch the elastic along the edge while you’re sewing. The fabric should ripple up behind the sewing machine foot as you sew. Sew the length of the elastic, stretching it all the while. When you get to the end, backstitch in place.

Repeat this for the three other corners.

That’s it! It’s not quite as snug as a store bought sheet, but it does the job and you can pick whatever fabric you want.

I’ve been in full baby crafting gear lately. Last night I sewed a couple of little pants and I’ve been tinkering with the idea of making a onesie out of an old T-shirt. I have a special one in mind, but I thought I should test it out on a junker first. Success!

It was about a 45-minute project. And here’s how I made it:

Materials:
A small adult T-shirt, or a child’s size shirt
A store-bought onesie (to use as a guide)
Velcro (the kind you have to sew on, not stick on)
Stretchy materials needle (recommended, but not required)

Directions:

First, turn your T-shirt inside out and fold it in half down the middle. Fold your store-bought onesie in half down the middle and lay it on top of the T-shirt so the collars line up and the shoulders/sleeves run along the top. Cut around the onesie leaving about 1 inch of a border on the sleeves and sides but about 2.5 inches at the bottom crotch area. You should end up with one piece of fabric where the front and back are connected at the collar/shoulder/sleeve area.

Trim the sleeve edges how you prefer. The sleeves just happened to end up right where the big shirt sleeve began so there was a sewn edge that made it easy to trim.

Turn under the edges of the legs (there should be four of them) and sew in place. This looks pretty rough since I didn’t have a mini screwdriver to install my stretch needle. When you sew jersey be sure you stretch it out as you’re sewing it so there is give to the seams.

Sew along the sleeves and sides of onesie using a half-inch salvage.

Turn right-side out and turn under the bottom crotch flap of the front twice over. This will add extra thickness to better stabilize the velcro. Pin and sew in place.

Next, turn up the bottom crotch flap of the back, but just once over. You want the back flap to be about two inches longer than the front flap once the edges are turned under. Pin and sew in place.

I chose to use three squares of velcro, but a strip would work also. Sew the softer side of the velcro to the wrong side of the back flap. Sew the rougher strip of velcro to the RIGHT SIDE of the front flap.

And there ya have it — a make-your-own onesie. This would be a fun project if you had a sports team T-shirt or a TUXEDO T-shirt, which is the reason I wanted to try this out. Stay tuned for my tuxedo onesie in the next couple of weeks.

And, as always, please contact me if part of this tutorial isn’t clear.