For all life’s messy little moments, we’ve got the perfect solution, a bib without a
tie. Super easy project. Let’s get started.
So if you’re like me you’re always dashing about. And having a bib that you could even
put the car or something is really a great solution. Now this is a great project. And
I just want to say quickly thanks to Pat. A dear friend of ours that came up with this
project idea. And we have a wonderful free pattern right here called Cut the Apron Strings
because there is no tie. We just have these wonderful poly beans up here in the shoulder
parts. All you’re going to need is one yard of your favorite fabric. I chose this incredible
fabric from Moda. It’s a gradations kind of pixelated and I love it. Look, this is
what the other side looks like. So it was a full ombre print. Now what I went ahead
and did is I’ve already taken the yard and I’ve trimmed up the top and bottom. But
before we do the next thing we’re going to go ahead and turn it right sides together
and get ready to mark it for the neck hole. So it’s still folded where the 45 was. And
I”m going to take a second and press. Move those poly beans. We don’t want to spill
those while we’re working here. And I’m just going to go ahead and press this nice.
I’m lining up my outside edges. We’re going to do all of the work right off of the
bolt basically, right off of the yardage here. So I’m just hitting that seam over there.
And now what I want you to do is look at the fabric. If your fabric has a direction to
the print itself, maybe you’ve got some cute little pigs eating, you know, ice cream
cones or something like that on there, make sure your direction is right sides up. We’re
going to be approaching the top of our bib. We’re going to need a small ruler. We’re
going to come over like it says here on the instructions, 4 ½ inches from the edge. So
I’m coming over 4 ½. And I’m just going to mark with my sharpie. I’m going to spin
it. And I should probably flip this up so we can all read it, 4 ½ again, a little mark
there. And then what I like to do myself is, I”m going to find the center. So I”m at
12 ½ inches between because I already trimmed off my selvedge so your numbers might be a
little different. So let’s just come over about 6 ¼, put a little center mark. And
then I’m going to drop down another eight inches here. This line I’m going to do a
little bit of a dotted line on the backside of the fabric. This will all be cut away.
Try not to mark through in anyway that would bleed through your stuff.
Now that that’s been done this way I want a really nice arc for that neck hole so I’m
going to fold it one more time. And now I can see that’s the starting point. There’s
the bottom. And for me I just find it’s easiest if I take my pen out. It doesn’t
have to be a perfect half circle but I’m just going to go ahead and make myself kind
of a dotted line that’s going to represent the neck hole. What I want to point out though,
this section right in here is where those beans are going to be so the more if this
is your skate ramp, the more vertical we have in this area, the better it’s going to be.
So a couple good inches in here to be the pocket for where the beans go. Once that has
been drawn into place I’m just going to get my hands safe. I”m going to use my rotary
cutter with my fingers behind it. And I’m just going to cut this arc natural along that
dotted line just like this. Ok? We’ll set that aside. We won’t need that again later.
And now what we’re going to do is we’re going to come down here. We’re going to
leave an opening so we can turn it back to right sides out later. So I’m going to start
about oh say six inches from the bottom edge. I have a quarter inch edge guide marker on,
cotton threads. You could use poly because it’s technically a garment if you want it
to be. I’m going to backstitch there and I”m going to sew all the way to this front
corner and right off so I can pivot. Line myself back up. And we’re doing this edge
first just to make life easy. The other is going to be folded but I’ll still stitch
it. Now I’m coming up to that top corner and I can see that my fold shifted a little
bit with my arc but it’s not going to be a big deal at all because it’s just a little
bib that were making so I’m just kind of helping realign those edges. Coming back over
here and as I sew through my arc I am going to keep my quarter inch seam allowance edge
guide here in place. And I’m just going to slowly let those corners come through.
Just matching up those two edges of the fabric. Now I’ve come to the halfway mark, so I’m
just going to double check to make sure everything is lined up nice as I finish it out. We’re
going to go right across the top here. And I am going to sew as I said down the folded
side because that’s going to keep all the math symmetrical. It’s not a requirement
but then this side would be technically a half inch larger than the other side if we
don’t. So I’m just going to zip down to the bottom on this. Wasn’t kidding when
I said zip. Now I’m going to come off that bottom edge again and prepare to go to the
opening. Oop, let’s get a little better start, there we go. I only need about four
to six inches to fit my hands through. So that’s about my hand’s length there. I’m
stopping, I am cutting. And all of the sewing construction is technically done. I want to
go ahead and take a moment and dog ear these little corners up here so that we can make
a nice crisp turn out. We’ll also do our bottom two corners. I told you I didn’t
get a very good start. It’s alright, we’ll be able to fix that as we fold it right sides
back out.
So that’s what we’re going to do next, we’re going to go right sides out. And I’m
going to stick my hand up in here and I’m going to work all the way up into those shoulder
parts. Get our nice little crisp corners like we were working towards. You could trim that
arc in the neck if you made a little steeper arc. I never find that it’s necessary but
some folks that like to do garment sewing will do that as well in there. . There’s
those nice crisp corners there and here. Now we’re gonna finish the entire project with
top sewing. And we’re going to put the beans in one at a time up into the shoulder pieces.
So what I’m really going to do is do 90% of the top sewing now, then the beans.
So we come back to the machine. And I”m going to make it look and start at this corner.
So I’ll finish the top sewing to finish the hole. I need to leave that hole so I can
get up inside to put the beans in place. So what I’m going to do now is this is a fun
little topstitching trick, is I”m going to find a thread that I like to match. And
as I begin down the seam I come down about, oh let’s say six to ten inches ahead of
myself, roll that seam out and then I just let it roll flat through there using the edge
of my foot now as my guide. And I’m going to go do this all the way around the project
except for the bottom edge. And we’ll be ready to get those beans in here in just a
second. Let me jump into caffeinated mode for us all. Ok as I promised I’ve stopped
at the bottom corner so I still need to topstitch this whole edge. It’s open so we can fill
the beans.
Now the next step for getting ready for our beans though is we need to mark our pockets.
So I want to use a five inch ruler and I’m going to flip this over to the darker side
of the fabric just so I can see a little bit better. So I’m coming down here basically
five inches parallel from that top edge. And I’m just going to make myself a line that
I should be able to see over at the machine and line now. So we make our lines first and
then we get our beans ready. That’s just right on that. I’m going to have to make
myself an arrow to see that one. Fun, ok. Now that that’s there I’m going to use
my poly pellets and roughly about half to ¾ of a cup per shoulder. So one of the things
I like to do is, uh oh, getting away from me. Fill this about up like yay, like this.
Now what I’m going to do, I really want the beans to just get in the corner so I’m
kind of coming in here, holding my cup upright. And I”m going to go all the way down into
this corner and I”m going to pour them into just the one side at a time. Now that it’s
here, I’m using gravity in my favor. I”m getting my edge guide completely out of the
way right now. I should have done that earlier. And then what’s going to happen is gravity
keeping off of the table has gotten those beans all the way down and out of my way.
I can see that beautiful chalk line there. And now I’m just going to go ahead and topstitch
and lock it in. Backstitch there. Coming across. Making sure there’s no beans in my path.
And I’m using now just the wonderful stripe in the fabric to follow that chalk line. And
I’m going to lock this down. Now what I want to do is I want to cut this and I”m
going to come and do one exact row of stitching just like that just next to it. So I’m now
using the edge of my presser foot on the sewing. I’m no longer worried about the beans getting
down there because they’re already trapped up on the first. This is a security stitch,
a safety stitch. I keep it all in place over time stitch. And I’m locking that down.
And I”m coming up here to do the other side. Put the same amount in both sides of the shoulders,
like I said roughly half to ¾ of a cup of beans. That’s more than was done on the
other side. Of course I’m using my iron filling cup here for the scooper today so
I’m not obviously being too worried about accuracy. And of course a couple of caffeine,
Wily Coyote earthquake pills before every film shoot always makes me good and shaky
anyway, right? There we go.
Now we need to get this back up in here. We’ve got to get it to this shoulder here. Keeping
my cup upright. I’m working myself all the way over, all the way over. Dumping it down.
Get the cup out of the way. Get the cup out of the way. I got the cup lost in the fabric
out of the way. There it is. Still though gravity. That’s the thing that I want you
to see if nothing else. Gravity is working in our favor. There’s also a neat trick
where you can use a pen or a pencil or something along the edge down here to keep these beans
back. Of course I could have put some safety pins in the way. But this works really good.
Sewing on that line. Double checking to make sure I have no escaping beans. Lock it down.
We’re going to do that last security stitch. It was about a foot’s width down. Ok and
now that construction is all set up. All we need to do now is come back down to our bottom
seam and just finish this right back out. So I’m going to pick up where I left off
on that corner, tie it back in. Get it up and rolling. And I’m just taking a second
and pulling this bottom corner nice and taut. And what that just did is it flipped those
seams in for me. Now I’m going to pinch kind of halfway through that raw edge. And
what we’re doing now is we’re sealing the entire bib closed. We’re going to go
all the way across that so nice and easy right over to our other bottom corner. Lock that
down and all I have to do is trim those little pieces of thread. And I’ve got yet another
fantastic, full length body bib there.
And I know what you’re thinking, he’s going to ask us today what kind of fabric
are we going to use. And he wants us to tell us in the comments below. But that’s not
it. I want to hear what is your biggest mess story. Of course I want to know what kind
of fabric you’re going to use. You only need one yard’s worth. But I want to hear
your greatest mess disaster and why you’re making yourself your very own body bib right
here at Man Sewing.
Oh, hey are you still in here. I thought you would have been checking out some of those
other great videos. You know we’ve got a link there, over there. And hey don’t forget
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at Man Sewing.