How to Make These Easy Sew Bandana Bibs
Bandanas are not just for babies. Here’s how to make these easy sew bandana bibs.
We have a special little guy in our school who uses “chewlery” to help him. As a result, he tends to drool a lot and so I was asked to sew some bandanas to absorb the moisture so that he wouldn’t soak his shirts. I had previously sewed terry cloth bibs for my own children when they were little. In order to update it a bit and make it “cool”, I decided on an easy to sew bandana-style bib made from PUL fabric. You don’t have to be an experienced seamstress or tailor to make these.
Easy Sew Bandana Bibs – Fabric Choice
There were two criteria for the bandana bibs – they had to keep his clothing dry and they had to be absorbent.
In order to keep his clothing dry, I had thought of PUL fabric. PUL fabric is a waterproof fabric that has a polyurethane coating on it. It is also machine washable. It is commonly used in diapers and diaper covers. However, I have heard about PUL fabric being used for reusable snack bags as they can be washed. I was able to find PUL in our local fabric store. There are online sources as well.
For absorbency, there are a couple of options – flannel or terry cloth. The bibs I had made for my own children were terry cloth and so I decided to stick with that. As terry cloth has a tendency to shrink up a bit, I pre-washed the fabric before making the bandana bibs.
Easy Sew Bandana Bibs – Pattern
A quick google search results in a number of patterns for bandana bibs. The one I used is from Project Nursery – you can find it here.
As the pattern was intended for an infant, I decided to make this bit bigger for our students. I did this simply by extending the lines. You’ll see that I added length on the side of the fold line.
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Pinning and Cutting
Pins put permanent holes in PUL fabric, so when cutting out the pattern, I used pattern weights. My pattern weights are hexagonal nuts from Home Depot. You can use pins for the terry cloth – there is no issue there.
You should have one piece of the PUL and one piece of terry cloth.
Now, I did pin the two together – but I was careful to put the pins on the outer edge. Pin the two pieces of fabric, right sides together.
Sewing
With right sides together, sew all around the banana, leaving a 2-3 inch opening on one end. Be sure to take the pins out as you go. The PUL fabric has a bit of stretch to it, so be careful when sewing together.
Once sewn together, clip the corners. This reduces bulk in the corners.
Finishing
Flip the bandana inside out. I used a corner tool to make sure the ends were all the way out and that there were sharp corners.
To finish it off, topstitch or edge stitch all the way around – including over the opening that you had made to flip it inside out.
Fasteners
For the finishing touch, you just need some sort of fastener to keep the bandana around the neck. There are several options – velcro, buttons, snaps, hook/eyes. I personally thought that velcro would be the easiest. So I sewed a small square of velcro in each corner.
There you have it! It’s quite an easy to sew project. You don’t really need a lot of higher-level sewing skills to do this.
I got 1 metre of each fabric and was able to make 15 bandana bibs. While that may seem like a lot, I remember the days with my children when I was hanging their bibs on the back of chairs to dry off as when they were teething, they really soaked them. Having multiples also cuts down on the need for laundry. I had quite a few bibs for my children – I remember hanging them on the back of the high chair. Sometimes my kids would go through quite a few in one day, so I was thankful to have many.
It’s been a few months now and the bandana bigs are working well for this little guy. They machine wash easily and do the trick. He’s a happy little fellow and I was glad to help out. Please share with me your PUL bandanas – I’d love to see them.
