How to Repair a Wool Blanket

Inspect your blanket. Make sure it is completely clean and free of lint. Identify the flaws in your blanket that need to be fixed. Possible flaws could include fraying edges, rips in the middle of the blanket and rips in any joining seams and small holes. Make a list of all of these issues.

Decide on a repair strategy. Large rips require a blanket to be cut into pieces, with the larger piece being made into a new blanket. Smaller holes can be patched with a similar color or contrasting color. Write down your necessary steps in the order of most to least invasive.

Cut a blanket with a large rip in it into two pieces. Measure the larger piece and write the measurements down. Create bias strips out of your lining fabric. To do this, iron your fabric and lay it out on the cutting table. Inspect the weave of your fabric. Make sure that the fabric weave is pointing vertically and horizontally across the table. Cutting along these horizontal and vertical lines creates a straight grain. Bias strips are cut along the diagonal grain. Use your ruler to draw lines that are diagonal to this grain. Draw strips that are two inches wide and three inches longer than the sides of your blanket.

Pin a strip to each of the longer sides of your blanket with the right sides facing down and the strips facing inward. Sew them in place half an inch from the blanket's edges. Fold the blanket over and iron it at the seam. Turn the blanket over. Fold the edges of the lining 1/4 of an inch inward and iron it to form a crease. Fold the lining over the raw blanket edge until it covers half an inch of the blanket edge. Pin the blanket in place and sew it right along the edge of the fold.

Turn the blanket back over. Pin a strip to each of the shorter sides of the blanket as you did with the longer sides. Trim each end of these strips half an inch beyond the blanket and side lining edges. Fold the ends 1/4 of an inch inward and press to form a crease. Stitch in place 1/2 of an inch from the edge. Fold over and iron. Turn over the blanket. Fold the ends around the corner of the blanket. Fold the lining in 1/4 of an inch and iron to crease. Fold over until it covers 1/2 of an inch of the blanket edge. Stitch in place alongside the edge of the fold. Use the same technique in steps 3 and 4 to repair a full-sized blanket with frayed edges.

Iron the wool fabric you have chosen to make your patches. Fold the fabric in half. Inspect your hole or holes that you want to patch up. Choose the size of your patch. Draw a circle or an animal silhouette on a piece of paper. Cut this shape out out and pin it to your patch fabric. Cut around the pattern, allowing for a 1/2 inch seam allowance around a circular patch. Gently fold under 1/4 to 3/8 of a seam around a circle, bit by bit. Pin and iron the folds. Place the patch over your hole with the right side facing you and pin it to your blanket. Sew the patch in place. Turn over the blanket and pin your second patch so that its edges match the patch edges on the opposing side. Sew along the edge of the fold.

Pin your animal shaped patches on both sides of the blanket in place over the hole without folding under the patch's edges. Use a zig-zag stitch on your sewing machine to sew in place. Carefully trim the exposed edge outside of the zig-zag without clipping into the zig-zag stitch.