Giraffe and Whale Onesies

Hi friends!

I hope you all had a great weekend. Mine was solidly OK, but I still feel like I could use about 20 more hours of sleep. Which is pretty much a constant feeling for me these days.

Anyhow. I’m sharing some embellished onesies with you today. I made these, oh, back in August. Nothing like staying on top of things, amirite?

But hey, you’re still getting to see them, right? That counts for something, I’m sure.

I made these for “Baby Sam,” who is Little Man’s second cousin. We had a baby shower for him back in August. I’m not sure what we’ll call him when he gets older, because I think Little Man thinks his name is actually Baby Sam.

The giraffe and whale designs were one of the first designs I ever made, way back when my best friend had a baby and I decided I could figure out how to make an appliqued onesie. Now that little baby is nearly 5! So many onesies since then.

Since these were some of my first designs, I didn’t have stencils, so I made them with the thick vellum I always use. Then I traced the designs onto the fabric using a disappearing fabric pen. You can also use a pen or pencil on the back of the fabric, but it makes it harder to choose exactly what part of the pattern you want where.

Then I cut the different pieces out of my chosen fabric, lined with Heat n’Bond.

Then I ironed the designs onto the onesies. (I use Gerber onesies most of the time, but you can use any bodysuits you can find.) I also prefer to sew through as few layers as possible, so I do what sewing I can before ironing them onto the onesies. There wasn’t a lot to sew ahead of time on these designs, you can see there’s just one line of stitching I did on the whale, and the button eyes on both the whale & giraffe.

All that’s left is to stitch around the outside.

Like always, I used a blanket stitch to attach it.

Here’s the giraffe.

Isn’t he cute?

And that’s it. Trust me, these look way harder than they are. People who’ve never tried anything like this will think you’re a sewing genius. So go ahead, impress your friends!