Simple Gifts
Friday, March 12, 2010 at 6:00AM 
A friend (though not a close friend) has a new baby and I wanted to make a little gift to send to her. I stitched up this burp cloth with the baby’s name and added some binding and a little ruffle to make it more special. This couldn’t be easier. First, I preshrunk the cloth diaper and trimmed the ends to make them square. I embroidered the baby’s name on one end and bound the other end with a fabric strip. I made a ruffle and sewed it to the end with the name and then covered the seam with another fabric strip (these strips were cut on the straight of grain). One trick I have adopted when sewing trim strips like this is to use a decorative stitch to do the final stitching. In this case I used a serpentine stitch which easily catches both front and back edges of the trim strip without having to worry too much about what is going on underneath.
My friend Kathy once talked to me about the obligation that comes with receiving gifts. She notes that sometimes a gift is not worth receiving because the gratitude that the giver expects in return is emotionally not worth it. Or sometimes the recipient is an acquaintance where an elaborate gift would be inappropriate, might even make them uncomfortable. Other times the situation doesn’t warrant a big gift. I am always on the lookout for small, simple gifts for those times that you want to tell someone you are thinking about them. I would love to start a dialog here and have you share ideas for simple but lovely gifts for these occasions, babies, weddings, hostess gifts. Please share in the comments section.
burp cloth, gifts, machine embroidery, sewing in gifts, machine embroidery, sewing 
Reader Comments (3)
I love wrapping packages with wire-edged ribbons. Once every year or so I go to a ribbon outlet where you can buy gorgeous ribbons, all priced 50 cents a yard or much less. Of course, you usually have to buy 50 yards of each ribbon. So for the occasional birthday gift, I've given a person 3-5 yard lengths of eight or ten wire-edged ribbons for her to use when wrapping her packages. It seems like a "small, simple gift" (especially as I make it clear that the ribbons are from the outlet).
Kathy, this is a great idea. Next time you go to the ribbon outlet take me along!
Here are some adorable onesies that I came across. Love all of the creative ideas on this blog.
http://tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com/2010/06/adorable-baby-gift-using-silhouette.html