DIY: MINKY DOT BLANKET

Hey everyone!
I'm super excited to show this to you today.
Minky dot blankets to me have become more popular lately because of the fact that they are perfect for the new arrivals in your home.
I got one from several people and I had never even heard of this material before.  But let me tell you, I am a HUGE sucker for this blanket because I've always been a soft blanket person.

Now of course you can go and buy these pre-made.  I got mine from different friends that got them from a website called BEBE BELLA DESIGNS.
Granted I love the blankets I got from here because they always have something different.
Problem is for me is that it seems like they don't keep the patterns a whole lot from what I've noticed and it's so sad because I wanted to get the same blankets I got for my friends.
Now there's also the fact that you have to pay shipping.  Now don't get me wrong, I LOVE there blankets.  I just feel that I want to make my own and not be limited to what they sell.

So I went out and bought some of that fabric which I discovered that Hobby Lobby always has it on sale for 30 % off! in the store! Now they always want to give you an opportunity to save so they give you a 40% coupon you can use any day and don't have to wait for a special sales day like Joann's.
It may not sound like much but when you add things up it's a lot cheaper than buying it from someone else.

So here are the sources for my project today
Pin: DIY MINKY BLANKET! From ICraft
Video tutorial: Double sided minky blanket

Materials needed:

• 1.5 yards of Minky dot in the color of your choosing
• 1 yard of cotton fabric of your choosing
• Stitch Picker (because I can guarantee that you will have to fix it because mink dot is notorious for bunching up when sewing)
• Matching thread for the fabric you've chosen
• Needles
• Straight Pins

So here are the steps:
Step 1:  Lay your material out on the floor with the mink dot up and the cotton fabric facing the WRONG way on the minky dot.
What this means is that you want to sew it with the wrong side of the fabric facing you because when you turn it inside out later, you'll be hiding the stitches you made on the sewing machine.

Step 2: Pin around the entire blanket except for about a 7 inch hold on one side.  Why? Because this whole is where you will turn the material inside out later
It's important on your spacing because if you don't know how to sew like me, the more pins you have, the easier it will be to sew it so that it won't come apart and sew weird or have the problem that I did and get bunched up.

 Step 3:
After sewing around the blanket, Turn it inside out.  Once you have take the corners of the blanket and cut them.  The video tutorial will show you what I mean.
This way when you turn it inside out, the corners won't be all bulky.

Step 4: Now pin across the hole and sew across.

*optional steps
Step 5:
Now you can leave it as it is but I don't like how my blanket separates in the middle, and I didn't want to have annoying string sticking out everywhere so here is what I did.

Pin in 9 different spots on the blanket.  For me it was super easy because I had these large dots with the dogs in them to give me a good guide line.  if your material doesn't have that what  I would suggest is that you use a ruler and guide yourself across so that you are even when placing the pins.

Step 6:
Sew in a zig-zag stitch across your spots about 1 inch.
I know it's hard to see but that is what it looks like on the minky dot side.

And here you have it! All done!!!!!