Sewing for Beginners - Easy Doll Blanket

My girls love having their blankets nearby at bedtime and have been asking me to make their dolls a blanket too.  I sewed one quickly and decided it would be a fast, easy tutorial to share with you today.

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Welcome to week three of my Sewing for Beginners series.  I have shared two other simple tutorials in honor of National Sewing Month.  You can also learn to make a pillowcase and burp cloths.

This tutorial will show you a quick and easy way to make a doll blanket.  This will only take two pieces of fabric and you can add a middle piece for thickness if you would like.  There is no cutting and piecing of squares, rectangles, or triangles to make a quilted blanket.  I have plans to make a doll quilt in the future, but for now I thought this would be a good project for beginners at sewing.

Materials Used

1 Fat Quarter or cotton fabric of your choice
flannel, fleece, or Minky fabric for backing
thread
batting or fleece fabric for middle (optional)
Dritz Ball Point Pins *
Blue Water Soluble Marking Pencil *


1.  Start out by ironing your fabric.  You want it to be nice and flat.  The fat quarter will be 18 inch x 22 inch. You will need to cut your backing fabric to be about an inch longer in both directions so you can make the edging.  If you are using batting or fleece for a middle section, cut that to be slightly smaller than the fat quarter.

2.  Place your backing fabric with the pattern face down then layer ending with your cotton fabric on the top, with the pattern facing up.

3.  Next you will need to pin your fabric layers together so they don't move around when you are sewing.  I start in the middle and pin out from there.  That usually makes sure that the fabric isn't stretched to one side or the other.

Even though we aren't using small pieces to make a quilt, we are going to sew a simple quilting pattern on the blanket so it looks nice and the layers of the blanket stay together.  Use the water soluble pencil to mark where you will be sewing.  Start in the middle and work evenly outwards.

4.  When sewing, lower your needle into the fabric, lower the foot, sew a few stitches forward, then use the reverse lever or button to sew backwards over your first stitches.  Release the back button and continue stitching to the end and repeat the backstitch when you are finished.  This will make sure that your stitches do not come unraveled after washing.

5.  Next you will make the edging of the blanket.  You don't have to buy binding to add to the blanket, you will use the extra backing fabric and fold it over twice to make the edging.  I folded the extra backing once so it met the edge of the top fabric.

Then you fold it over again, so it covers a bit of the front fabric.  I pinned my edging so it didn't unroll while sewing.  I like to use a lot of pins just to make sure everything stays in place.

6.  Sew the edging, making sure to use the backstitch method when you finish the blanket.  I started sewing halfway down one of the sides of the fabric.  Generally I start at the corner, but when I was making it last night I remembered how difficult it was to stitch and backstitch on the thicker folded corners.  So if you start on the edge, it is a lot easier when it comes time to finish your stitching.

That's it!  You now have a soft doll blanket perfect for your little one to use with their favorite doll.  This blanket has already gotten quite a lot of use.  It has been a blanket, a wrap around dress, a picnic blanket for a living room tea party, and a cape for being a superhero.

Here's one more fun picture.  My cat likes to be in the way whenever I am taking pictures.  I had to keep shooing her away from the doll and blanket.  When I was done, I looked over and this is what I saw.  She has been sleeping on the blanket all morning.  The perfect blanket for a doll, or a cat to cuddle up on.

See you next week for my 4th tutorial for sewing for beginners.  I'd love to hear what your favorite sewing projects are!  Let me know in the comments below.