Taggie Blanket (Tag Blankie) Tutorial

I know I could completely get away with not telling you all how long ago I talked about doing a taggie blanket tutorial here. But, I'm just not that kind of girl. I prefer to berate myself publicly, even though it doesn't seem to help me in any way... It was almost two years ago. eeeeeeeek. How on earth does time fly like that?? I finally am getting around to it now.

To be fair, I haven't made a blankie in that long and last week, I noticed Peanut mesmerized at the tag on a stuffed monkey. Since poor Midget never got one, I decided to rip a tag blankie out for Peanut to try to make up for his second child photo syndrome. Surprisingly, I remembered that I said I was going to do a photo tutorial on here. Funny, since I can't seem to remember to put on my undies some days...

First, gather your materials.
Two 14 x 14 inch squares of fabric: I prefer fleece and flannel because they are fairly easy to sew and nice and soft, but you can use whatever material floats your boat.
Sixteen 6 inch long lengths of ribbon: I like to use varying textures, colors and widths of ribbon. You can coordinate them with your fabric or just use whatever you have on hand.
Coordinating Thread: I didn't worry too much about this because my non-patterned flannel fabric was light colored, so I used white thread. If you use a darker colored solid panel, you'll want to coordinate your thread.
Empty cellophane candy bags (Optional): I sewed in some crinkly panels, but once I realized I wouldn't be able to bring Peanut's tag blankie to church, I was sad I'd done it. : (

Here's my two fabric squares.








First, I sewed in the crinkly panels. I just took two empty candy bags (by the way, I LOOOOOOOOVE Everlasting Gobstopper Heartbreakers and wish they made them all year long but it's probably a good thing they don't because I'd have broken teeth and lots of cavities and I'd never look good in that strapless bridesmaid dress I have to wear in November) and cut off the end pieces and opened them up and cut them a little bit bigger than where I wanted to sew them onto and zipped around them. If your fabric has a right and wrong side, you would want these on the wrong side of the fabric. Midget was insistent her hand be in this picture. Silly girl!








Here's a front view of the fleece with the two crinkly panels sewn in.








Now it's time to pin on your ribbons! You'll be putting four ribbons on each side. Fold each ribbon in half and match up the raw edges of the ribbon to the edge of your fabric. The loop should be in the middle. Take your ruler out and lay it next to your material (if your fabric has a right and wrong side, you'll want the right side up) with the 0 at the end of the fabric. Place the middle of each of your four ribbons at 3 1/2 inches, 6 inches, 8 1/2 inches, and 11 inches on each side. Here is my blankie all pinned up.








Here's a step that isn't 100% necessary, but after making several blankies, I realized it makes everything a billion times easier than just pinning the ribbons on and sewing the two fabric squares together with the ribbons pinned inside. You don't have to worry about your ribbons being crooked, or poking the crud out of yourself trying to remove your pins by sticking your hand in the little opening, and it triple reinforces the ribbons, so (hopefully) your little one will have a harder time ripping the ribbons out of the blanket! Take a nice long stitch (I had my stitch length at 3 because some of my ribbons were only 1/8 inch wide) and sew just along the ribbons at 1/4 inch. Lift up your presser foot after you sew through each ribbon and put it down before the next ribbon. You can see the extra thread on my picture below. Clip your threads and proceed to the next step.








Next, put your other piece of material directly on top of your ribbons, making a ribbon sandwich. If your fabrics have right and wrong sides, match up the right sides.










Now pin your sandwich together and sew a 1/2 inch seam allowance around the outside, leaving a 3 inch opening for turning. I used a stitch length of 3, but you may need to vary yours depending on the fabric you choose. Remember, the thinner the fabric, the lower the stitch length. If you use cotton and flannel, you'll probably want to do a stitch length of 2.








Clip your corners about 1/8 inch from the corner so you'll have nice sharp corners. Clip off your threads.








Turn the entire thing inside out and poke out your corners. I use a chopstick to make nice square corners.








Tuck your opening inside and pin it closed. Sew 1/8 inch seam around the entire blankie (I used a stitch length of 2). TA-DAAAAAAAAAA!! Tag Blankie!!








Peanut immediately fell in love with it. Not as much as I'm in love with his utter gorgeousness...