the crib skirt

what should have been the easiest part of making the nursery bedding turned out to be the most annoying project i have ever done.   not difficult, but just time consuming and tedious.  instead of just making straight panels for the crib skirt, i decided to make them with pleats and inside the pleats would be a coordinating fabric.  it took WAY more fabric than i had anticipated, therefore using up all the fabric i was going to use for the window valance.   we're talking hundreds of inches of fabric that was eventually folded to make pleats and then pinned and sewed to a piece of muslin, which was cut to the crib mattress measurements.

here is what the mile-long crib skirt looked like, draped over my ironing board...

this picture does not do the length of fabric justice.  there is more piled to the left, out of the field of focus.

i don't have a picture of the finished project yet because we have no crib to put it on.  we should be ordering one soon.  i'm pretty sure i will have a heart attack if the crib skirt doesn't fit, either. 

here are some basic instructions for a pleated crib skirt that i loosely followed with my own measurements for this project.  it's a great starting point for making a crib skirt or a bed skirt.