rechelle's lifelyrics

We’ve had a tradition in our home to pull out our Christmas decorations the day after Thanksgiving, and spend family time decorating together with Christmas music in the background. But this year was a sort of “back to the beginning” kind of day, because it was just the two of us working together for the first time in over 30 years!

Usually, there are minor repairs to do on decorations with the glue gun, or burned out lights that need to be replaced as the decorations come out of their totes. This year, I decided to do a little sewing project as well. If you have a sewing machine, you may like to use my idea to add a little festive feel to normal throw pillows you have.

I had a Christmas table cloth that was the right size for a previous dining table, and it’s been pulled out of the tote and put back each year, unused, since we got our current, much larger, dining table. I finally decided to put it to good use!

I measured the width of the pillow I wanted to cover, and added an inch for seam allowance and depth. I added about half of the full width to the length so there would be enough fabric to tuck in on one end (20″ x 30″ for a 19″ square pillow). Step 2 was to sew right sides together on the long edge.

I don’t have a serger, so I made my first run with a serge-style stitch followed by a zig-zag stitch over it since the fabric was fraying pretty badly – both at about 3/8″ wide.

Step 3: Double-roll a 1/4″ hem at the top (no need to zig-zag with a rolled hem) using a single stitch, and when I got to the seam in the middle I folded it toward the needle to avoid stretching across the seam.

Step 4: Finish the edges of the sides and bottom and then sew together, leaving the rolled hem (top) open.

I basically made a pillow case that was plenty long to fold the top in for a great fitting pillow cover. If I had a serger, the project would have taken half the time, but it really wasn’t bad taking the extra time to make sure the completed covers won’t fray when they need to be washed.

I got so inspired from doing this project, I made a small table runner with the leftover fabric!