I made some pelican bibs the past week. Cleaning up remnants of food or trying to remove the stubborn stains from your little ones’ clothes is never fun. Hence, this is a great (and rather quick) project for parents with babies who are weaning or learning to feed themselves. You can save yourself (or your loved ones) some time while ensuring that your little one looks stylish at the same time. 🙂
Materials Needed – Two 1/2 yard fabric (I used PUL for the front, and a simple white jersey fabric for the back. I would suggest using waterproof fabric for the front to reduce the chances of food stains, but any types of fabric should work for the back.) – 2 yards of binding (I used knit ribbing for mine, but the normal cotton bias tape will work fine too) – snaps or sew-on velcro
Pattern Pieces You will need a pattern for the main body of the bib and another one to make the pocket. I used an old bib of my girl as a guide, and intentionally make the pocket piece a bit bigger than the body so it would ‘open’ up when sewed onto the main body. This would ensure that the bib is functionally and will really ‘catch’ remnants from little messy eaters 😛
Steps 1. Sew the front and back fabrics, wrong sides facing, together using straight stitch. This will be the body of your bib
2. For the pocket of the bib, cut two pieces of the pocket pieces using the front (waterproof) fabrics. Then, like what you did for the body, sew the two pieces, wrong sides facing, together using straight stitch.
Here’s what you should have by now.
4: Mark the centers of the pocket and body with disappearing fabric pen.
5. Line up the centers together and clip the two pieces together. (Pins are not recommended for PUL and knits fabrics.)
6: Sew along the edge of the pocket to attach it the body of the bib
7: Attach binding around the edge of the body. It is probably easiest to join the two ends of the binding at a somewhat straight edge. I have marked out the recommended places in the diagram below.
9. Put the bib on your little one! (Or, in my case, since my girls are past bib-wearing stage, use their toys as models :D)
