My Sewing Blog

Yesterday I had a terrible day with my embroidery machine. I embroidered an adorable little cat, but the fabric seemed to end up puckered. I think it was because it was a spaced out design and every time the thread jumped to a new section it pulled the fabric tight. The eyes had so many different colours layered over the top of each other that the fabric became solid and the thread kept breaking. At least the needle didn't break. Oh, I started off by embroidering it upside down and ended up unpicking around 1,000 stitches. I'll probably sew up the nappy and then give it away. After that I thought I'd try doing the 'wild' design again in more boy-ish colours. I managed to get it the right way up but I don't like the colours I picked. Sigh! I did make this though and I love the way it turned out. I think it had around 21,000 stitches and it took about an hour and a half to stitch out. But I think it was worth it. Okay, moths aren't exactly the first thing yo...

I finally finished the embroidered nappies! These are from the Opulent Monsters diaper pattern. Of course, I'm not happy with them! The designs are all too high up, and I messed up the PUL pocket for the embroidery. I layered it up wrong, but the backside of the embroidery is fully enclosed inside the PUL pocket, which is probably the most important thing. I'll sell them all at a discount though, since they're not perfect. After talking about how great the design for the pocket in this nappy was, I re-read the instructions and realised that I sewed it wrong. Here's how it's supposed to look. I'm not sure I like it this way. One of the advantages of sewing it wrong was that you could hold the nappy by the wing and the insert would just slide out. This way you actually have to open the pocket and rummage around to pull the insert out. I also think the PUL panel is a bit too large. The whole front section of the nappy is now waterproof, which isn't much good ...

When I was looking around at patterns and links for all things cloth pad related, I couldn't seem to find anything about the costings for making your own. Since I plan to sell them for profit, knowing how much they cost to make is important. I'm not sure I've got it quite figured out yet, but here's what I have so far, in case it helps someone. The base has two layers of flannel (or flannelette as it's sometimes called, or winceyette or brushed cotton!). There's also a layer that backs the topper piece. I was able to cut enough pieces (top, bottom and base of topper) from one metre to make 9 pads. That was 9 assorted size pads, so I can't say how many regulars or XLs etc you could make from a metre. The flannel I bought was £3.60 per metre, making each pad cost £0.40. If you picked a fancy quilters flannel or designer/organic flannel then it would be more like £12 per metre. That would almost triple the cost per pad. For the topper I used a printed flann...

I think I've had my shop open for about a week now. I've not had any sales. I'd read that a lot of people go several months before making their first sale, so I wasn't really expecting to sell anything. My shop has 49 views and 16 visits so far. I think half of those visits were from family though! A few of my nappies have been viewed 5 times now. Someone also marked my shop as a favourite which was really exciting! It's all quite nerve wracking really. I keep checking the stats and worrying I'll never sell anything, and at the same time I'm hoping that I don't sell anything in case people don't like my stuff and leave bad feedback. I found a site called Etsy Rank, which analyses your keywords etc. Apparently there is a low demand for pocket nappies. I kind of figured that. It says the competition is medium, although it includes the whole of Etsy, and I know there aren't as many UK sellers as American ones. I joined the dreaded f-word. That...

Once you start making nappies, cloth pads seem like the next logical step. They mostly use the same types of fabric as nappies so it's a good way to use up some of your scraps. I know they're only tiny, but I've never been a fan of sewing them. The wings would always turn out uneven, or there would be some kind of fancy quilting needing done that I'd always get off centre and overall, my cloth pads would look like they were sewn by someone who'd never used a sewing machine before. I actually stopped using the ones I had. I planned to make more, but the thought of making a bunch of uglies put me off. I was doing some research before I opened my shop and I found that cloth pads are a big thing. This is great, because think of how much waste is being saved from landfill! They're actually pretty mainstream these days. I mentioned them to a few people and ended up finding out that two people I know use them! Since there is a market for them I thought I'd give...

This is the pattern that I've used to make the nappies I'm selling in my shop. It's a one size pattern, with a snap down rise. When I was making nappies for my own babies I don't think I ever made one with a snap down rise. I did use the Kayla's Cloth Kits one-size pattern a lot, but my baby was big enough when I made them that I never needed to use it on the smaller settings. This is really quite a trim fitting pattern, so think it might be quite difficult to stuff. I love the idea of having a different colour fabric on the wings though. It really jazzes the nappy up and if you cut the pattern without the wings you can get more cuts out of your fabric. The wings can be made from scraps. Prints with an accenting solid, or solids with a print on the wings look good too. The pattern has a welt pocket for putting the inserts in, and I absolutely hated making it! I felt like it looked kind of messy when it was finished too, so I changed the way I did that. I made m...