Free Fabric Pillow Tutorial

Here's how I just made a non-atomic pillow sewed up with recent free fabric from Fabmo and my priestess-sister Rue. She made herself a really nice purse and sent me the leftovers since she knows I love scraps! Her fabric is the multi-colored one there, it is really soft, kind of a chenille. The other fabric is much stiffer but has a lot of texture too. I like contrasts in textures on pillows, it makes them so much more fun to touch and encounter.

Here they are stitched together into a big enough piece to make a background for the sheer applique that I want to use.
I also have a pillow back fabric that I am using, so that is a limit to the size too. I just know I want to make a BIG pillow. Bigger than the usual anyways.

Here is how it looks on top of the pieced background. Too much, covers up all that rich color, so I'm going to stitch around the motif and cut away the extra.

After satin stitching around the embroidered motif in gold/brass thread I use my applique scissors to cut off the excess sheer fabric.

Then it is just an easy stitching up of the completed front to the pillow back. You can see the wrong side of the satin stitching there. Make sure to leave enough room to turn the pillow rightsides out and to be able to stuff it easily.

Stuffing with batting bits, edge trimming, shredded old socks and other miscellaneous stuffity-stuffs (technical term). Tip: Use your rotary cutter to shred up old socks into non-lumpy pieces, much easier on the hands than scissors! Make sure to stuff the corners of the pillow really well if you like them pointy, then hand-stitch the opening closed.

And there you have it, basically a free pillow (except for the thread). Please Note: This pillow has been deemed too heavy for pillow fights by the management.

I should print that up and sew it on like one of those tags you see on store-bought pillows and mattresses...

And here is the reverse side.

Here it is in the "grandpa chair", my leather chair that I inherited from my Grandfather. It is completely sprung in the seat and you need all kinds of pillowage under you to make it comfy. I think it is the most comfortable chair in the house and I use it as my hand-sewing station, complete with Ott-Light and all. So now I have a BIG pillow which feels great and supportive for my back.