Keeping Up With Kate: Becoming Crafty: No-Sew Crib Rail Guards

Ok, I have a confession to make. I am not crafty. At all. Some people like to D-I-Y. I like to B-U-Y. It's just my style. So when Kate learned how to pull herself up and chew on the rails of her crib, the first thing I did was go shopping. And I was shocked. It was going to cost between $40 and $60 to put on crib rail guards. Not to mention that most of these products are 1) ugly and 2) don't get very good reviews. Clearly even shopaholics such as myself have a breaking point. So I decided I would sew my own. Then I remembered that I can't even thread my sewing machine. Or sew (minor problem).

But I was determined, and that's when I came up with what I think was a brilliant idea. You know those no-sew fleece blankets people make? I decided to take the same basic idea to make Kate's crib rail guards. And you know what? IT WORKED!

Here's how I did it:
(Please remember that since I am not a crafty person, these instructions may not be the best. Bear with me and please excuse any blunders, because I'm really quite proud of myself.)

To start, I bought two yards of fleece fabric and cut three rectangles in the following sizes:

Front Rail Guard: 53'' x 12''
Side Rail Guards: 33'' x 15''

Kate has a Graco Lauren Crib. You'll need to take your own measurements for your crib, but maybe this can help give you an idea of where to start. When measuring the length the rail guards needed to be, I added about an inch to make sure the guards would be long enough. For the width, I measured the area I needed covered, and then added 4 inches on either side for the fringe (so 8 total).

For the front rail guard:

Fold the piece of fabric in half length-wise. Then cut your fringe about 4 inches in length and about 1 inch apart. Don't worry about cutting straight. I used a pair of kitchen shears for this project since I didn't have sewing scissors, and not a single cut I made was straight. You can't even tell on the finished product.

Then unfold the fabric and place it over the crib rail, tying the fringe together underneath. When you get to a bar of the crib, tie two pieces together on the same side, instead of tying them with their pair on the opposite side.

Continue this until you have tied all the fringe. I would highly recommend tying them loosely at first, then going back and tying them in a knot. That way if you need to change anything, it will be a lot easier (I learned this from experience).

And that's it! How easy was that? If you want you can do the same thing for the side rail guards, but that will leave the corners of the crib uncovered. While Kate can't reach the corners of her crib to bite, I think it looks a little neater to have the corners covered as well, so...

For the side rail guards:

Do the same thing you did for the front rail guard, but when cutting the fringe leave about the last 6 inches uncut (again, these measurements will vary depending on your crib).

Cut the corner away by cutting perpendicular to the fringe.

Cut a piece of fringe that runs perpendicular to the others.

Cut another fringe, but make it about half as long as the one you just cut.

Now cut the other corner away.

When unfolded, the fabric should look like this.

Drape the fabric over the crib rail and tie the fringe the same way you did for the front rail guard. To cover the corners, take the long pieces of fringe and tie them together around the the corner.

Then take the short pieces of fringe and tie them together.

And ta-da!

Note: I ended up taking the ends of the knot from the short fringe and tucking them under the tie I made with the long fringe, just to make sure the corner would stay put. If you are a crafty person maybe you can think of a better way to do the corners, but this worked well for me.

And that's it! This was seriously such an easy project. And now I have crib rail guards that not only saved me money, but are cute! The total cost for this project was $14.09, which was what I spent on the fabric. Since I never buy fabric, I have no idea if this is a good price, so maybe this project could cost even less.

Here are the before and after shots: