Car Seat Blanket

This is the thing I've been meaning to make since we used it with Owen. I took Casey's boy one when we moved thinking I could use it for either gender, and because I thought I would have a boy baby next. So much for mother's intuition. Now Casey is having a boy, and I am having a girl, so it was time to make my own and send the boy one back to her.

The fabric I used still looks very boyish. But it was slim pickings at Walmart, and I wanted to get this thing done without waiting for a trip to the big city. That is also the reason I used a heavy duty metal zipper. It was the only long separating zipper Walmart had.

All it is is two pieces of fleece sewn together with a zipper half on each side, slits cut out for the car seat or stroller straps (I think the velcro to keep the slits closed is pretty optional, but I had it anyway, so I used it to be like the original.), and a little rectangle of fabric sewn on the back to flip over and tuck in the open end of the blanket. It took a little over an hour and a half from measuring and cutting to finish. I must have pulled the fleece when I was putting the zipper in on one side because it ended up longer by like 2 inches. Oops.

Inside

Outside

Zipped up in the car seat

I realize you aren't supposed to put stuff in between the baby and the car seat, but really, the compression factor of this is pretty negligible. It's two layers of fleece. That's not much more than a light jacket. It's worth it to keep a baby warm in an upper-Midwest winter. And now I have enough extra fleece to make some sleep sacks.