Thursday, March 19, 2015

Pleated Crib Skirt

Hello!  I am back today with another nursery post.  A few weeks ago we decided to go ahead and purchase the crib.  I was torn between two cribs both made by Davinci.
This first crib is the classic Jenny Lind crib and it was the crib I envisioned from the beginning but then I saw this crib:
The Davinci Liberty crib has a classic spindle style as well.  The drawback of this crib was that it $150 more than the Jenny Lind so ultimately I decided that it wasn't worth that much extra money so I went with the Jenny Lind.  After assembling it and putting it in the room I was not disappointed.  It is beautiful, classic, simple, and has a wonderful vintage vibe.

Now that the crib was in the room, I decided it was time to get to work on the next major sewing project for the room: the crib skirt.  I figure that I want to get the big sewing projects out of the way before it gets too hard to get up and down from the floor.  I was inspired by this pleated crib skirt:
*One disclaimer about this post: this is not a tutorial.  I still consider myself a novice seamstress and there are far better tutorials out there but do feel free to use my ideas as inspiration.  

 I loved the simplicity of it and the pleats.  With the inspiration in mind, I got to work drawing up a plan.  I start by measuring the metal piece of the crib that holds the mattress.
I added a 1/2 inch seam allowance to the measurements of that piece.  I then measured the distance from the floor to the metal piece.  I decided that I wanted to put two 4" pleats in the long side pieces and 1 4" pleat in the short side pieces.  I added 8" inches for each pleat to the length plus a 1/2 inch seam allowance.

I decided to use white and navy fabric for the two contrasting fabrics.  The navy would be the bottom third of each piece so I calculated the height with 1/2 inch seam allowance for each piece.  I ended up needing 2 yards of the white and 1 yard each of the navy and muslin for the deck piece.  I chose a medium weight twill fabric for the white and navy fabric.  I also purchased some coral grosgrain ribbon to cover the seam between the navy and white fabric for each piece.  I bought thread in coral, navy and white.

The longest past of the this project was cutting all of the pieces.  One thing to note is that the long side pieces are longer than standard fabric width so I had to cut a of 4 pieces of each fabric to complete the long sides.  I calculated the length of each piece so that the seam would be hidden in one of the pleats.
My first step of sewing was to sew the pieces together for the long sides with a half inch seam.  I then pressed the seams flat.
Next I sewed the navy and white pieces together for each of the sides with a half inch seam and pressed the seams flat.
Next, I cut the coral ribbon into pieces that covered the seam between the navy and white fabric for each side.  I then top stitched the ribbon along the top and bottom edges.
After that I sewed the hem along the sides and bottom of each side.
My next step was to add the pleats.  This takes a bit a playing around in order to get it just the way you want it.  This was probably the hardest part of the whole project.  I got a little frustrated so took a break from the project for a couple of days.  It worked out in the end so no worries :)
Next I pinned the sides to the deck piece with right side together and sewed them together with a half inch seam then ironed the seams flat.

One step that I almost forgot was to tack the pleats down to help them lay flatter.  I didn't take a picture of this step, sorry!


I am satisfied with the final product.  It is definitely far from perfect but I think it looks lovely especially in person.  We don't have a mattress for the crib yet so I am sure it will look even more awesome when we have it all put together.  

That dresser in the first picture is an awesome antique store find.  It is a lovely 1950's dresser that we scored for $125 and it is the perfect size to use as a changing station. That sweet blanket on the crib was made by my husband's grandmother.  It was given to us several years ago for our first born and I just love it. 

I am in the middle of about 3 other projects for the nursery plus I also completed a little porch update recently so I will have many posts to share in the coming weeks!

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