My sister called me up about a week ago and asked me to make some mittens for her. At first I was confused, it's still summer (sort of) and when the baby gets here she won't need mittens for at LEAST 4 more months. But she told me that babies scratch their faces a lot while they sleep. So mommies put mittens on them to protect them from that. the more you know... Many baby items turn out to be really expensive when they really don't have to be. So we hopped over to the fabric store and got 4 colors of thin soft fleece. About 1/4 of a yard each. There's quite a lot of fleece still left over when I was done so you'll be seeing more of this soon ;)
You will need:
1/4 yd. fleece or any baby soft fabric
10" elastic or opt for elastic thread
scissors
matching thread
matching ribbon
1. Cut out four gumdrop shapes (or pac-man ghosts) 3 1/2" long and 4 1/2" tall tapering ever so slightly towards the top. You can also cut this on the fold, that way you're only cutting out two.
2. Right sides together, sew up 3/4 of one side. This is so it lays flat the entire time. It's easier that way.
3. Woops! I had to change colors because I forgot I was making a tutorial and just finished the yellow ones without photos lol. Anyway, open up the lil gumdrops, you can press the side seam open here if you'd like. I didn't because it wasn't necessary.
4. Fold the bottom edge up about 2cm, press, and sew straight across.
5. If your using a strip of elastic cut the length of each mitten minus an inch and a half. If using elastic thread, just go ahead and thread your machine.
6. Straight stitch for the first few stitches with the elastic an inch from the bottom. You wanna straight stitch here making sure not to have any gathers at the side edge so that the next step (9 & 10) doesn't turn into a headache. Pull the elastic towards the other end and sew straight across to create a gather on the opposite side.
7 & 8. It should look something like an octopus without any legs. You could have used a zig-zag stitch on step 6, but I think the straight stitch looks just as good.
9. So now you'll see why I had you leave the side edge un-gathered (is that a word?). With right sides together, line the sides up so that the elastic meets up (this is why I left my elastic so long, so you could see that they match up on both sides). Also be super sure that the bottom hem matches up as well!
10. Pin and continue to sew all the way around starting from that first stitch (black thread).
11. Almost finished! Time for the finishing touches. Before turning your kitten mittens right side out, make sure to trim off excess thread and cut down the fabric as close to the thread without cutting it as you can. Take your time! Nothing sucks worse than nearly finishing and having to go back an re-sew. Go ahead and turn it right side out. Take a matching ribbon and make a bow as big or small as you'd like. I cut mine about 7" long to make each of my bows. Grab your hand needle and sew it in place. I recommend sewing through the center knot of the bow at least twice to ensure that the bow never comes undone!
AND VOILA!
So I wrapped 'em up in some scrap fabric for my sister to pick up and I went a little bananas with the ribbon, can you blame me though? They're so pretty! The pink one has rainbow thread :D<333 Little bundles for the little bundle. (totes came up with that on my own.)
If you end up making some of these please do let me know! I'd love to see them!
Take care <3
XOXOXO
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