Nursery Pillows

Today I'm working on the first of two pillows for my next grandbaby's nursery. I'm making envelope pillow covers so they can be removed easily and washed as needed. Won't this yellow and white chevron fabric make a cute pillow?

The finished size of the pillow form is 20" square. I cut the fabric 21" x 46". This way all I have to do is finish off the two ends and sew all the way around and it's done. It's a really fast and easy way to do an envelope back pillow cover.

I turned under both short ends 1/4" and then turned them under another 1/4" so there is no raw edge showing. I topstitched that close to the turned under edge.



I put the fabric wrong side up and found the center of the pillow by matching the two turned under ends. I finger pressed the center for a reference point.

I like to do French Seams for pillows that are going to be washed. Since this is for a baby's nursery I want them to hold up well to washing. By finishing the seams this way, I feel that they hold up better than just a regular seam.

I used the center fold as a reference and brought the finished end on the right side up about 1./4" to the left of the center line.

Next I folded the left side of the pillow toward the center. I overlapped it 1 1/2" over the other end. I pinned that in place at the top and bottom. In the photo the raw edges don't match so you can see the overlap. But as you can see by the next photo I pinned it in place with the edges matching. I also pinned in a couple other places to hold things together.

 

The chevron "stripes" don't line up here but they do line up when the pillow is finished.

I know it's weird to sew with Wrong Sides Together (WST). I am so used to Right Sides Together (RST) that I really have to think about it before I sew. It's just automatic to do RST. But when doing French Seams the first seam is WST. I stitched 1/4" on both sets of raw edges.

Using the opening for the pillow I turned it so that now it is Right Sides Together. I used a Point Turner to make sure that the corners were nice and defined. A friend's husband makes this one. It is a Point Turner on one end and a Finger Pressing Tool on the other end. It is a little long but it is perfect for this job.

I pressed the whole pillow cover really well after I turned it Right Sides Together. Even though I really only have 2 seams to sew I actually stitched all the way around the pillow cover with a 1/2" seam allowance. That will keep it's square shape.

After sewing all the way around the pillow the two actual seams are completely covered. Now there are no raw edges inside the pillow to fray after multiple washings. This technique is also good for sewing tote bags. It makes the seams really strong.

Now it's time to turn it right side out. I used the Point Turner again to make sure that all 4 corners are well defined. Here's the finished product on the glider/rocker in the nursery. 

I think it turned out very cute and so does my daughter.

Happy Sewing,

Carol

Mother's Day Craft

I wanted to do a special Mother's Day craft with my two granddaughters. I saw this project on Pinterest and pinned it to my Grandchildren board. I took the basic idea and then changed it up a little bit.

Inspiration

I drew a basic flower shape onto some cardstock. I folded the paper so I was cutting two pieces at the same time because I wanted each flower to be double sided with the pipe cleaner stuck in between.

I also wanted to put pictures of the girls in the center of each flower. Most of the pictures I chose were taken when I was watching them while their mommies were at work. 

Tristyn, my 2 1/2 year old granddaughter was the first to make her project. Before she got to my house I had already made the flowers and had glued the photos onto them. She chose the pipe cleaner colors because I had a few different shades of green. They were long pipe cleaners and I wanted to use half for each stem. I got away with that for the first one but after that she wanted to use the full length. Once we had the pipe cleaners I glued them between the two layers of the flowers. 

I wanted her to decorate the pot too. I just used an ordinary clay pot from Home Depot. I gave her crayons and she colored the outside and the inside of the pot.

I let her pick the paint colors for the petals. Of course she chose all of the colors that I had. Together we dipped her index finger in the first color. Then we put it on the flower petal. After we did the first one she knew exactly what to do for the rest.  She used one color per flower. She still had colors left so she wanted to put her fingerprints on the outside of the flower pot. I turned it so they would go all the way around the pot. Then she decided to stick her whole hand in the paint and she spread that on the pot.

I put a piece of florist foam in the bottom of the flower pot after the paint dried. I poked holes in it with a scissors so the pipe cleaners would go in easier. Tristyn chose where each flower went. The ones with the really long stems were kind of tricky. I just bunched up the pipe cleaner inside the pot since they were way too long. Then I covered up the foam with some tan shredding so it looked like soil.

Here is her finished product.

I did Elsie's next. She is only 2 months old. So I had the pipe cleaners in place and had the pictures on the flowers. Basically all that was left was her fingerprints. I thought I'd try adding footprints or handprints on the pot in addition to the fingerprints on the petals. 

I chose white tempera paint for the fingerprints and footprints. I thought it would be the easiest color to wash out. If you've never done fingerprints with a 2 month old, it's a challenge. I had to really work to only have one finger to dip in the paint. I tried the footprints first for the flower pot. The first attempt, you could see the toes and most of the foot. The second one was pretty much a smeared blob. I tried to hold her hand so that I could get a handprint and it was obvious it wasn't going to be successful so I abandoned that idea. Here she is with her finished project. I think it is a special gift for her mommy's first Mother's Day.

 I didn't really think about putting this on my blog until after the fact. So there aren't as many pictures as I'd like. But they were so cute when they were done, I wanted to share them. Both of my daughters loved their gifts.

Happy Mother's Day to all you moms out there.
Carol