Flannel Baby Blanket With Satin Binding

This Instructable is for an easy basic baby blanket. It has two layers of flannel and a satin binding. It is very baby-friendly in that it can be machine washed and does not need any other special care. The blanket only takes about an hour or so to make.

-two 1-yard pieces of flannel (or fleece, or minky, or any other cuddly baby-friendly fabric)
-one package satin blanket binding (at least 140 inches long, I use Wrights)
-thread
-a sewing machine and knowledge of how to use it
-something to mark your fabric like tailors chalk
-scissors
-sewing pins

Using a straight stitch, sew your fabric together about 1/2 inch or so in from your marks. I use the edge of my presser-foot as a guide. It doesn't matter what color thread you use in this step. When you are done sewing, remove the pins and cut along your marks.

***If you have a serger, you can surge along the marked line instead of the sewing and cutting in Steps 4 & 5.***

Here we are going to attach the binding to the blanket so that it has nice neat mitered corners. The trick is to do one side of the blanket at a time so that you don't get bunching in the satin. In the pictures, the slight bumps in the satin are quite exaggerated. It looks nice and smooth in real life.

I will refer to two zig-zag stitches:
-zz1 is a very tight (short stitch-length) zig-zag such that the zigs barely clear each other. You want the width to be ~3/16 inch. On my Brother machine the stitch length is 1.0 and the stitch width is 5.0.
-zz2 has the same width but a longer stitch length (~1/8 inch between zigs), something that looks pleasing to you. On my Brother machine the stitch length is 2.5 and the stitch width is 5.0.

When you sew the satin on to the blanket, stitch near the edge of the satin. Because the shorter side of the satin is up, you will always catch the longer edge, but you want the zig-zag to straddle the satin edge on both the top and the bottom.

Sandwich the flannel in the satin at the prepared end so that the shorter side of the binding is up and the fold of the satin lines up with the blanket edge. Do this so that the satin covers a little more than half of one of the blanket sides. Pin from the beginning of the satin to the corner of the blanket. Starting at the tip of the folded satin, use zz1(backwards then forwards) to secure. Make sure you are catching both the top and the bottom edges of the satin! Then use zz2 to continue stitching to the end of the blanket. If the satin slips some and you have to adjust the pins, don't worry, that is why we are only doing one side of the blanket at a time. Your flannel might have a little fold right at the end near the straight stitch, and that is OK too because it will be covered by the satin and no one will know! When you get to the end, back-stitch about 3 or 4 stitches to secure. Cut thread.

***Tip: if you are getting a lot of slippage of flannel vs satin, after you finish the initial folded bit use both hands to grab the fabric & satin behind and in front of the needle and pull gently to create more tension where the needle is. Make sure you move your hands in the direction of the fabric and feed it through at the same speed as the feed dogs while sewing. I find that when I do this, I don't have to reposition any of my pins and I can go the whole length of the edge without slippage.

This is the most fiddly part of the whole process. When done right, the corner looks very neat and tidy.

Pinch the edge of the blanket and open up the satin. Bend the satin so that the corner of the satin and the corner of the blanket are at the same place, then close the satin so that there are satin folds coming out at 45 degree angles from the corner. Pin.

Now sandwich the rest of the blanket edge between the satin and pin to secure.

Since the satin is slippery, folding the corner can get a little funky. I usually pin through just the back layers of satin once I have them folded nicely and then turn over and and fold and pin through just the front layers of satin . Then I put pins all the way through all of the layers and remove the first ones. As you can see in the 4th picture, I usually have two pins per corner when I am done. The trick is to get the 45 degree folds to line up on top of each other. When you sew, you want the zig-zag to straddle the two edges, so the folds you have to be symmetric to within your stitch width.

Now that you have your folds pinned, use zz1 to secure the folds near the corner (back and forth about 4 stitches each), then switch to zz2 to finish the 45 degree folds, turn the corner, and sew the rest of the blanket side. Err on the side of caution to make sure that you catch both sides of the folded satin. They might not line up exactly and thats OK, as long as both sides are secure, the blanket will be very durable! Again, adjust the pins if needed, just make sure that the middle satin fold lines up with the flannel edge.

Repeat this twice more. For the last corner, pin, but don't sew yet.