Made with Love, for baby Ava

When Lola was born, my sister-in-law gave me the most beautiful blanket ever for her! I loved it so much, I begged her to tell me where she bought it so that I could get my hands on another one! Of course it was handmade and since then, I have been dying to try to make one on my own, I just had no idea where to start so I kind of let the idea go out the window...
That was, until I was reading Dana's blog, Made, one day and discovered a whole new world! It is really incredible all of the tutorials that she offers (for free, holla) and how precise they are! While poking around, I about fell over when I saw her tutorial for a faux chenille blanket! It is what I had been searching for (but really forgot I was searching because it had been so long)! With a baby shower just a few days away for my friend Jessica, I knew exactly what I was going to attempt (and pray I didn't screw up) for her baby, Ava.

Let me start off by saying that I am a rookie with my sewing machine I got for my birthday almost two years ago and if I can make this blanket, so can you! While I have done little projects here and there, I feel like this blanket really kick started my excitement for what I just might be able to figure out how to sew on my own! And I don't know if you remember me mentioning it before, but it usually takes me like 45 minutes to get the bobbin working correctly, well...not anymore! I am happy to report that we are best friends!
I took pictures of my process, but really, NO ONE does it better than Dana! Seriously, if you want to make this faux chenille blanket, head over to her blog! You will be amazed at how easy she explains things (even tells you what to do if you make a mistake)! I can only take the credit for the finished product on my end, the how-to is all her!

Crazy to me that 5 yards of different colored fabric (4 of them solid colors) can make such a beautiful blanket!

It is not a lie, this blanket takes close to forever to make (okay, not forever, but it took me very close to 8 hours. The sewing of lines and then the cutting of lines never seemed to end)! What I like about this blanket is that if your lines aren't the straightest it is pretty forgiving and it is okay if it isn't perfect!

Back side of the blanket:

Faux Chenille Side of the blanket:

Another great thing about this blanket, it gets softer with each wash, and has been through the wash twice at our house to get it ready for the shower. Not going to lie, I was so worried it was going to fall apart in there the first time I ran it through!

There you have it, my first faux chenille blanket, made for baby Ava, with lots and lots of love from her Auntie Jenni and Kyan. He was my pin man, handing them to me and taking them out as we got to them on the machine! He wants to start sewing and loves to craft just like his mama!

And yes, there will be more of these blankets, my kids are begging for their own! So when we get back from vacation, we'll be off to the fabric store to pick out something for them! I am going to attempt to make theirs a little bigger, not sure how I am going to make it happen, but I am going to try!

Faux Chenille & Minky Blanket

I am in love with faux chenille blankets, like serious love with them.  They are so soft {and get even softer the more you wash them}.  I knew after I made one for a baby shower last year that I just had to make Lola one of her very own too!  

Fast forward about 9 months later, 'cause that is how I roll around here, I finally got around to making her one.  Only hers wasn't just faux chenille on one side and cotton/flannel on the other, as recommended, but rather cheetah print minky fabric!  I wasn't sure if it would even work, based on everything I read about minky {first time sewing with it was on this project btw}, but I knew that it would take my already favorite blanket to make to the next level if I could get it to work!

Let me start off by saying that YES, sewing with 4 layers of cotton to make the faux chenille side and one layer of minky works!  Just be prepared to triple, if not quadruple, the time it typically takes to make this blanket {which is about 8 hours}.  You can also expect to discover muscles that you never knew you had before while sewing!  I wish I would have had someone take a picture of me while sewing this bad girl {yes, it is a girl blanket}, because I literally had to plant my left let against one of the legs on the chair and brace myself as I pulled the five layers through the machine!  I am sure I looked ridiculous, but I was determined to make this work!  I also used a standard foot on my machine, so nothing special is needed!

I am not going to try and do a tutorial on this or how I made mine, but rather direct you to where I go for directions when I make these blankets.  Dana, who blogs over at Made, has an incredibly easy {and free, 'cause she is awesome like that} tutorial to follow and I highly recommend you go there for this part if you are interested in trying to make your own!  Seriously though, if you can sew a straight line you can make this blanket {with or without the minky}, just be prepared for how much time they take!  I promise you that I am no where close to being any kind of expert sewer, I really know just the basics.  If I can do it, you can too!   If you decide to use minky fabric, click here or here for helpful tips!  The only thing I have for you is...

Thirty-two hours later {or something like that}, I LOVE how it turned out and I am pretty sure my cheetah print lovin' little girl agrees!  

I also love its versatility and how different and beautiful it looks on each side!

On the left is how it typically looks when her bed is made {which is like never...okay, I take that back, when my mom stays with us it is made then}.  On the right, I laid it out on top of her full sized bed so you could see how big it is!  I think it ended up being about 1 and 3/4 yards and was 52 inches wide {pretty sure standard size is 45 inches?}, no reason really, just liked how it looked!

I couldn't find binding that matched, so I ended up making this myself?!  I went to just about every quilting store in the valley and it just wasn't the right color or size.  Finally, the sweet ladies over at Mulqueen showed me how to do it on my own!  I think they could see I was about to cry real tears.  I could do it again, but don't ask me to explain it right now!  I am sure there is a great tutorial for this somewhere!  They told me to hand stitch it, but I didn't listen.  Way too much work!  Honestly, you can only tell it looks a little bit crooked when you look super close, but thought you might wanna still see that it is not perfect!  I am a firm believer that imperfections happen to be beautiful and give things character! 

My crooked lines don't seem to matter to her either!  Whew!  She LOVES her blanket!!!  I love that it is one that she will be able to grow up with and when she gets too big, it can easily become a throw blanket for her!

 Sharing with my favorite party peeps this week!