Reunited with my Sewing Machine

Before Cooper was born, I spent a lot of time crafting and sewing.  I knew I wouldn't have the same amount of time once he was here, so I was glad to get a lot of projects done while we waited for him.  But I was starting to miss sewing.  Last week, Cooper took a few good naps (longer than his usual 30 minutes) so I sat down at my sewing machine for the first time since he was born.

I decided to make some suck pads for our Lillebaby carrier.  Right now we don't necessarily need them, but Cooper is starting to drool a lot so they will be nice to have.  And they add some fun color/patterns to our gray carrier.

The first set I made followed this pattern for straight suck pads.  I used this cotton fabric for the front, the light blue flannel for the back, and a cut up towel for the inner lining.  I decided to use Velcro for the enclosure because I already had some.  I also added a few ribbons along the bottom to attach toys, teethers, or pacifiers as needed.

This set was very easy to make and I was able to knock them out during 2 of Cooper's naps last week.

Here they are on our Lillebaby: 

While I was looking for a pattern for suck pads, I also came across this pattern for curved ones (I used the pattern for the Tula since it is similar in size to the Lillebaby and the Ergo).  The curved ones fit more tightly along the curves of the carrier, but I've read they can make it difficult to raise the headrest.  But I decided to try out a set of these as well and then see which ones we liked better. 

 I found this fun dinosaur printed cotton for the front of the suck pads and  used 2 layers of flannel for the inside.  I again used Velcro for the enclosure and added a ribbon to attach things as needed.  These ones were definitely more difficult to make than the first set.  The pattern was more complicated and it involved more steps of sewing different pieces together to get the curved look.  They were still fairly easy to make, but definitely took more time than the first set.  I did a lot of this one while David was home to help with Cooper.

I think they turned out well:

I think if I make another set I will probably stick with the straight version (the first pattern) just because it was so much simpler and I still think they fit well and look cute on the carrier.  But maybe once I use them more I'll really like the curved ones better.  Either way, it's fun to have a few options to "dress up" our carrier.  And I really enjoyed being back at my sewing machine creating things!

And thanks to this precious burrito baby for taking a few awesome naps so I could get these done!