Tiny Things: A Swedish Baby Nest and a Onesie

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Swedish-Baby-NestIn the middle of packing up to move, I decided it was the PERFECT time to sew up a few baby things. Makes sense, right? Need to procrastinate doing something really important? How about sewing instead! I went to Modern Domestic and picked up some Cotton & SteelΒ yardage, batting, and few other items and came home to whip up aΒ Swedish Baby Nest pattern that my sweet friend Jennie sent me. She was really awesome and had traced off and cut out the pattern pieces for me and translated the instructions. It was so easy to follow thanks to her help!

Baby-Nest-Sewing

The baby nest is made out of two pieces of fabric, a three-layer quilt batting “mattress”, a rolled-up batting bumper, and some bias tape to make a casing for a tie (I used twill tape). I pretty much followed the instructions exactly, except for two things. I decided to quilt the batting, because I thought that it would likely shift a lot and maybe bunch up if this gets thrown in the washing machine. And let’s be honest, it will be used by a baby, so it’s bound to be washed a lot! The other thing I changed was to add some extra fiber-fill to the bumper edge. The rolled-up batting wasn’t as plush as I wanted it to be, so I squeezed my arm into the bumper casing and added some extra stuffing. In the above photo, the right side is yet to be stuffed.

Two things that were tricky about this were getting the pull-tie into the bias-tape casing (totally bent my bodkin doing that), and evenly distributing the batting and fiber fill in the bumper. I’m lucky my arms aren’t much bigger around, or I couldn’t have reached the far curved edge to fill it!

Baby-Nest-QuiltingI’m so happy with how it turned out! I think that we’ll get a lot of use out of it, and I think I’d like to make these as baby gifts as well.

Baby-Nest-Detail

It took a certain furry someone about a day to find it sitting on my cutting table. He was purring quite comfortably when I found him, so I’ll have to keep this out of his reach when the baby isn’t in it.

Baby-Nest-DuncanMy other project that I’d had in my head for a while was a onesie. I know that they’re easy to sew up, so I though it would be some quick and satisfying sewing. I have some old clothes that I’ve been saving to cut up into baby clothes, and a t-shirt my brother designed a few years ago seemed like a great first choice. I got a Jalie onesie pattern at Bolt and made a 6 month size. It still seems so tiny!

Tiger-Room-Onesie

I used a fold-over elastic (FOE) to encase the onesie edges, and I can’t say that it made anything any easier. Next time I’ll stick with making my own knit binding! It was hard to get the elastic to stay lined up along the fabric edge while I used my cover stitch machine to attach it. In the end it looks fine, but I had to use so many pins to hold everything in place, and I had to resew the neckline FOE at least 3 times to get it to lay the way I wanted. Now I need some snaps for the crotch and it’ll be done.Β Tiger-Room-Onesie-1I’m excited to make more tiny clothes and baby projects! They really do go together quickly. I might as well sew some more little things while I pout about not being able to make a Grainline Studio Alder shirtdress to fit me right now!

  • Looking at all your pics, I’m wondering if I wrote an instruction wrong about the bias-tape. It looks liked you wrapped it around the seam? It’s supposed to be sewn on flat over the seam, so you have an edge stitch on each side of the bias-tape that covers the bumper seam.
    Does that makes sense??? No wonder you had problems with threading in the pull-tie πŸ™ Still looks great!!!
    The first one I made, I didn’t have any batting at home for the bumper, so I took some felt I had in my stuff & filled it with some fiber fill & then rolled it into a sausage to pull through πŸ™‚

    • I didn’t wrap the bias tape around the seam. With the tape that I purchased, one side of it was a LOT longer than the other side, so although one side is edge stitched, the other doesn’t look like it is. I didn’t have the patience to re-iron it, so I may have created trouble for myself! Also, I think that the twill tape wasn’t such a great choice for a tie. Something smoother that wouldn’t hold on to the bias tape would have been a better option.

      I have a BIG box of batting, so if I make more of these at least I know I’m stocked up for filling the bumper!

      Thanks again for the pattern, Jennie! πŸ™‚

      • You’re welcome, Amy! πŸ™‚ You’ve actually given me some ideas on how to make the babynest better, so I’m going to play around with the pattern & try to make it into a pdf πŸ˜‰

        • I think that a PDF is a fantastic idea! I would be happy look over it once you have it written up and check it all for you and pattern test it again. I’m sure you’d sell many copies of the pattern, based on how many emails I’ve had about it!

          • Lovely Amy! <3 That would be great if you want to give it a look over, I'll email you sometime this week I hope πŸ™‚ I'm just starting to make mini tests with my new ideas, Hubby has been put on baby duty πŸ˜‰

          • Okay! I’m here whenever, so don’t rush on my part, although it looks like lots of people are interested in buying the pattern (yay!). Good luck!

  • Nicole

    Oh my gosh… my ovaries are hurting. These are great!!

    • Thank you! And you make really adorable babies, sooooo…. get to it and I’ll send you a baby nest! πŸ˜‰ Haha!

  • Carol Jones

    The baby nest is beautiful,Is there a pattern available. Thanks

    • I received the pattern from my friend I mentioned in my post. She may be able to direct you to somewhere that you could get the pattern, as it is not something I have ever seen available in the States.

  • Connie

    The baby nest I’d adorable. Where can I find the pattern?

    • Thank you! I received the pattern from my friend I mentioned in my post. She may be able to direct you to somewhere that you could get the pattern, as it is not something I have ever seen available in the States.

  • Julie

    That is so funny about the cat finding the baby nest. I just love animals. πŸ™‚

    • I KNEW that he wouldn’t be able to resist it! πŸ™‚ I’d crawl in there too and take a nap if I could!

  • Deb

    Completely adorable! I’m the mom of 6 kitties, so that’s my take away πŸ™‚

    • Cats are so funny! He always assumes anything I make (especially quilts) is just for him to lay on. I’m sure I’ll find him in this quite often!

  • Dana

    I think, for scientific purposes, another bed must be made immediately to see if the cat is attracted to that bed as well! Seems only fair….kitty needs his own bed!

    • Haha! Duncan has many beds already, he just wants whatever is newest. I am tempted to make another one of these though, as it was a very satisfying project. I’d like to see him try to decide which one to lay in if I made two and had them sitting side-by-side!

  • The nest is so cute!!! I love it! I couldn’t tell at first that there were lions in the print but that’s such a sweet surprise!

    • Thank you! Yes, I am really in love with this line of fabric. By the way- have you started your Preppy the Whale quilt?

      • Ack, no! I looked at the instructions and it was so intimidating!

  • Lena

    Adorable! I’m swedish bit I didn’t know that baby nests are uncommon in the us . They are common here, both home made and commercial, and very practical. It also adds an extra safety zone if you doze off next to the nest+baby after late night breastfeeding, so you don’t roll him or her over in your sleep. Nice choice of fabric too!

    • I love that they are commonly used in Sweden. I think that they are a great idea and very practical. I’m surprised I never saw anything like them before, but I’m sure that I will start to if Jennie makes and sells a PDF of her pattern!

      And thank you! I am a big fan of this fabric line.

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  • Brittney

    Hi! I’m an intermediate sewer, how easy would this be to make?

    • I think you’d do just fine! It’s not a complicated project, and Jennie has really well written instructions and photos to help. If you have questions, I’m sure you can email her as well.

  • loves sewing

    Your onesie turned out perfect for Emmerich!

    • Thanks! The only problem is that he is already wearing 6-9 month clothes, and I made a 6 month size with short sleeves! Ack!

  • Joy Jones

    I am trying to make a nest for my grandson and am having issues trying to figure out how to sew the bias tape on, would you mind sending me the directions on how to do that? Thanks

    • Hello, Joy! I would recommend that you contact the seller of the pattern, as she extremely helpful and would be glad to give you some more detail on those directions. I believe her contact information is on the pattern. Also, she did a sewalong for the baby next on her website, which you can find here (http://www.jaggedrose.se/blog/2015/07/scandi-baby-nest-sew-along/).

  • Debi

    Wondering were I can purchase the pattern. I went to etsy and could not find it. Does anyone have the pattern?

    • Hi Debi! I checked into it for you, and it appears the creator of the pattern posted this note on a baby nest sewalong on her blog: “Currently my Etsy shop is closed and my pattern is not available. When life has calmed down I’ll be back with an update about the pattern.” I’m sorry it appears to be unavailable right now! Perhaps if you email her, she may send you a copy. Here is her website: http://www.jaggedrose.se/blog/

  • stevie

    Hi, I am a sewer in a small place called Melksham (about 10 miles from Bath in Wiltshire). I sew/knit for our local NICU and Angel babies born too soon nation wide. I donate everything I make with no costs going to the patents or hospital. I have shown your Baby nest to the NICU nurses with the view to making some for their tiny babies, the nurses feel these would work really well (to help them feel more snug as if they were still in their mummies tummies). would it be possible for me to be able to get the pattern. Thank you Stevie. I have a face book page where I post photos of everything I make and where it has been donated to

    • Hi, Stevie! It sounds like you do some really lovely work for a wonderful cause. The owner and creator of the baby nest pattern is Jennie over at jaggedrose.se (http://www.jaggedrose.se/blog/2015/07/scandi-baby-nest-sew-along/). I would email her if I were you and ask about getting the pattern. Let me know if you don’t hear from her though!

      • Stevie Cooke

        Thank you for your quick reply, I have contacted Jennie and waiting for her reply

  • Jeanie

    Hi! I have come across this and wondering how to email the maker of the pattern. I scoured her blog and I can’t find an email address. I really want to make one of these! Can you help? Thank you πŸ™‚

  • Anna

    Is it possible to sew this baby nest without sewing machine? πŸ€” I mean hand-sewn. What do you think? Would it be durable?