Reversible Magnetic Wipe-Clean Toddler Bib with Pattern

I mentioned recently that my sister has been visiting. It has been so nice to have her around, and to have someone to craft with. My sister is expecting her third child and decided that it was time to make some new baby bibs. She still doesn't know the gender of the little babe so we wanted to make sure that we chose some gender neutral fabric.

I headed down to my mom's house where my sister was staying and we did some fabric shopping. The town is quite small and there isn't a huge selection of fabric to choose from, but we did manage to find this adorable Riley Blake fabric that we both liked and would feel comfortable putting on a boy or girl. Unfortunately there was not any laminated fabric, or any iron on vinyl available, so we decided to make due with what we had. We found some Medium weight vinyl available by the yard at Wal-Mart and decided that it would have to do. We made up our own pattern and found some fasteners of our choice (magnets-I was so excited). I had seen a magnetic bib in a boutique and thought that it was such a great idea. We found some extra strong magnets (not the typical ceramic craft magnets, but the nice shiny silver ones) and we set to work.

I have to admit that it would have been much easier if we had either the laminated or iron on vinyl, the vinyl by the yard proved to be a bit more difficult to work with, we had to be very careful that the fabric didn't shift as we were sewing, and that we didn't trap any strings or scraps of fabric between the layers of vinyl and the body of the bib. All in all we are quite pleased with the way that they turned out. I love wipe-clean bibs. We also wanted toddler sized bibs that a little one would be able to use for a while. We chose not to put a crumb-pocket on the bib, I would much rather sweep the crumbs off the floor that dig them out of a smelly bib pocket, but that is just my opinion.

We each made two bibs, the first we both put biased tape around to finish the edges, but with the second I chose to pink the edges of our fabric and then trim to vinyl just outside the pinked edges after sewn (don't pink the vinyl or you will end up with a very uncomfortable bib). I tried on the bib with the raw vinyl edges and it seems to be quite comfortable. We are thrilled with the magnetic closure, my son can still pull it off, but it takes quite a bit of effort.

If you want to make this bib as well click Here for the written instructions, but don't forget to click here and here, for pattern templates.  I am still trying to figure out how to compile everything in one place.  Sorry for the inconvenience.