Hooded Baby Towel

So, I can finally link up to all of these cool parties with all of the stuff I made for Amber's shower! (isn't she adorable! it was a tea party so we all had to wear a hat from her step-mother in law's collection...she even had one for the baby!)

First up to bat is a hooded towel. I had an idea of what I wanted to make, but all of the patterns I found online were gigantor....more for toddler than a little wee babe! So I winged it..tons of pics to follow so hopefully I won't lose you (sometimes my brain when crafting is a little mad hatter-ish!)

You'll need:

a regular sized bath towel

ribbon

matching fabric to applique

wonder under

an iron, sewing machine and coordinating thread


1. measure about 10.5" down from a short end of your towel (the edge with the boarder thingy...technical huh!?!). mark it and lob it off!

2. cut the small section in half (see above pic

3. fold the finished edge (top of the pic) back to the ribbing...I wanted to sew right along the edge where the rib started (see bottom pic). To form the "hood" just fold in half and sew (on the left side of the bottom pic). Give yourself a good sized seam allowance so that you can fold it open and sew each side of the seam down...terry cloth frays like crazy!!! Originally I was going to do hidden seams, but it made them way too bulky and I kept breaking the needle..if you have a super machine, go for it!

You'll end up with a pointy little hat....not quite the look I was shooting for so I opened up the hat, squared it of by just sewing a straight seam and cut off the point. In a perfect world I would have used the hidden seam for this, but I was running out of needles :) You can see in this picture how I opened the back seam and stitched each side down the center.

Now you have a finished hood :) Set it aside and grab the rest of the towel.

I forgot to mention before to trim the other side of the towel in order to get rid of the ribbing/boarder thing (I just cut right along the edge so that I'd have a straight guide)

4. Now that you have 2 unfinished edges, you'll need to sew them shut. I folded about a 1/4" seam, sewed and then folded it back under and sewed again (no raw edges) see pic below if that helps. Repeat on the other raw edge


5. I saw this on one of the patterns (which I totally forgot who did it) and thought it gave it a cute little extra touch! Fold your towel in half, right sides together (this will be the top of your towel...see the manufacturer's edge?...make sure that the right sides are together because seam ripping on terry STINKS big time!) Mark about 1.5" in and about 2" down. Sew a straight stitch along your mark.

This makes a super easy pleat.

6. Grab your hood. Using the seam from the pleat and the seam down the back of the hood to keep everything centered, pin the hood to the towel (right side of hood is on top of the right side of the towel) I'm not sure on the technical term for this, but I just sewed it so the seams were flat, not to sides together (the towel's edge was on the inside and the hood edge was on the top).
7. You're almost done!!! Pin your ribbon across the top and bottom edges (make sure to heat seal the ribbon!!!!) I folded the ribbon under on each edge to hide the sealed part. Then just sew around the edge of the ribbons (add a bow if you'd like, but it was super bulky under the machine.)

I had some leftover scraps from other shower projects, so I decided to add lady bugs to the bottom corners. Iron on wonder under to the fabric, cut out your shapes. Remove paper backing and iron onto the towel. Just for good measure, sew around the pieced fabric.

I totally forgot to take a pic of the entire towel finished (maybe once baby M. makes her appearance!)

Good luck, message me if you have any questions! It seems like a lot of steps, but this is really an easy project :)