Wednesday, March 31, 2010

5 minute pillow covers!

Here's the little tutorial I promised back in 2002. Just kidding, it wasn't that long ago, but it may as well be. I always go to the store during my selected holiday and choose 6, 7 or 8 coordinating fabrics. I think that's over kill but it happens to be hard to choose because I love all the fabrics and I have lots of pillows so I like to cover them all. So I only buy a 1/2 yard of each fabric that I like and really, you could get away with a couple inches less depending on your pillow size. Prewashing is always a good idea!

I take my half a yard and lay it out vertically in front of me RIGHT side facing up, then I fold the closest side in about half way and then fold an inch or so over as shown above. Keep in mind this is the WRONG side showing now.

Then bring the other side in halfway to match your first side and again fold a one or two inch fold over and make sure it overlaps the other one as shown above. It may take a trial and error to get them even to where your pocket will be in the middle of the pillow rather than 3/4 of the way up or something.


Here's another picture. It's hard to tell because I'm using fabrics that don't necessarily have a right or wrong side.


Then I just make sure my pillow is about the right size of the pillow and pin it to where it will need to be all the way along the edge. I've actually made so many of these I stopped pinning them. You may feel it's unneccesary as well but it's always good to pin what you are sewing to keep it together and avoid sewing it wrong.

Then one stitch down each side does the trick.


Other side...


Then turn them right side out, press if needed (I never have to because my pillow pulls it to an unwrinkled state). Then slip your pillows into the covers and you have a awesome season friendly display of pillows on your couches. So much fun!! And if your house is like mine, your regular season pillows totally clash when it's a holiday. So this makes it so much more flow-ish.


Here's my other three. Lucky number 7 is how many pillows I usually do.


Another pic! Enjoy! I hope someone makes some of these and sends me some pics. These were my fall pillows (Nov) by the way. I'm aware that it's almost Easter but I am trying to catch up on blogging at the moment after a crazy 6 months!