When my daughter Milie was a baby, we went through four to five bibs a day. She was a typical baby – a very messy eater! We had both everyday and special occasion bibs. We were given bibs for gifts and at holidays. Who knew one baby needed so many bibs!
As Milie grew, we used bibs less and less until she finally got the hang of eating. Her bibs took a beating: from food and from repeated washings. But I couldn’t just give them away – I am a little too sentimental. I packed the bibs away with her other baby memorabilia and mementos. Recently, I cleaned out a storage room at the house and rediscovered that stack of bibs.
Baby Bib Quilt
Throughout the past 10 years we have been making quilts from baby clothing. These quilts included plenty of bibs. I always liked the bibs in the quilts. So I decided to make an all bib quilt from Milie’s bibs. But with any new type of quilt we make, we made a test quilt first to make sure that the quilt turned out as cute as I imagined. So we made our first quilt using bibs we found at garage sales.
We could have made a quilt with uniformed sized blocks with the bibs each centered on its block, but that method would be way to static and simplistic for my likes. So, of course, we used the Too Cool T-shirt quilt method of puzzling together multiple size blocks.
We also did not just want to center each bib on a block. Boring! Instead we choose a variety of placement options based on each individual bibs characteristics. Here are some of the ways we used bibs…
- If the bib was clean and had an interesting graphic, we may have centered it.
- Other bibs we cut in half and used them on two separate blocks. We thought this might be fun for a child to have to hunt for the other half of the bib.
- On a number of bibs, we left the Velcro and snaps functional. Also a great play thing for a young child.
- A few of the bibs were kind of grungy so we only used part of those bibs.
- We left a number of reversible bibs unattached to its block. The bib was simply sewn in the top seam. This allowed the bib to be flipped up to see the underside of the bib.
Uses For a Baby Bib Quilt
When we made this quilt, we did not have an end use in mind. I just wanted to make one. But as we worked on this project we thought of a few uses…
- A baby shower gift.
New and used bibs don’t cost a lot so it would be reasonable for either you to collect bibs or have friends and family each donate a bib. - Baby crawling blanket
As babies begin playing on the floor, you put a blanket on the floor for them to crawl on. This blanket would be perfect for that since it is colorful and has a lot of different texture. There are also snaps and Velcro for the baby to play with. - Wall Hanging
We are going to take this quilt and hang it in the kitchen at our Charlotte, Michigan location. It’s a perfect symbol of eating!
Sure, this baby bib quilt is a cute quilt and all. But it might not give you the warm and fuzzies. After all, the bibs don’t hold any meaning to you. Now, imagine this quilt made from your child’s bibs. That brings back a lot of memories and makes it a quilt to treasure.
