Baby wearing wrap

  Ever since Gaiw was born, she has loved to be carried and held. (That is her nickname, by the way. =)) I have a baby front pack, but she is growing fast, and now she is too heavy to carry on the front comfortably. I've been looking for a while for a backpack to carry her in, but they are all pretty expensive.
 
A couple weeks ago, my sister-in-law told me about a carrier she plans to use with her twins once they are born, the Moby wrap. It sounded interesting, so when I got home I looked it up. What I learned is this: the Moby wrap is a stretchy carrier used to wrap and tie the baby to you. It can be used from birth up to 35 lbs, but can't be used as a back carrier. There are carriers that are similar for back use, the main difference being the lack of stretch. When I looked closer, I discovered that these wraps are simply a long piece of cloth with tapered ends. So I made one:

   It was a little difficult, because that much of fabric is hard to sew with, but I think it was worth it. The fabric cost me only $12, with plenty leftover for other projects. All of the wraps I've seen for sale have been at least $30 (used) and usually closer to $100. Here is how I did it.

  To make it easier to work with, I folded the entire 6.5 yards down the length in half, then two more times, to bring it down to .81 yards. That also made it 8 layers thick, but since I was only cutting straight lines, it worked. This is after two out of three folds:

  Once I had the fabric folded enough, I slid my cutting mat underneath and cut the whole stack to 20 inches wide... making sure I cut the right direction so it was still 6.5 yards long once unfolded.

20 inches is just to the left of the yardstick

  I set aside one half and unfolded the other. Next, I brought the two long edges together across the entire length, then folded it in half the other direction again. I marked two yards in from the corner on the long side, and 4 inches up from the fold on the short side. Then I used a super long straightedge my husband picked up somewhere to mark a line between the two points. I cut it along that line with my rotary cutter, moving the mat as needed.

Fold at the bottom, short end to the right, slanted cut edge on top

   Now I had a basic wrap shape, I just needed to finish the edges. I used a narrow rolled hem... I took some pictures of that, but my camera threw a fit and they all came out super-blurry. If I owned a serger besides my itty-bitty serger with tension problems, I would have done a rolled serged edge, it would have been a lot faster and easier. You could also fold the edge in twice and sew it down.

 I added a bit of ribbon at the center of the wrap, to make it easier to find.

 

  I've only tried wearing the wrap one way so far, the Double Hammock Carry, but Gaiw was very pleased in spite of her expression in the picture, and fell asleep after about 10 minutes. I'm also planning on trying a couple hip carries, we'll see how those go. =)

  Thanks for stopping by,