It’s all a Sham

Just to refresh your memory, we are renting somebody’s basement. They have a very large house, and decided to do a completely self-contained basement so when they’re old and gray, they can have a family member move in and still live on their own. Pretty much the entire thing was furnished too. Meaning the couches, rugs, kitchen table, chairs, our dresser, and even our kid’s beds were already here, and are not ours. The carpet and walls are a nice neutral, but I’m not much of a neutral person. (my hubby is, so it’s called compromise….)

This is a picture of the couch we have, after my kids have been jumping on it and squishing the pillows down.

See the pillows? All different shades of gray. I mean tan. The couch is made of down, and it is SO comfortable. But I felt like I wanted some more color. I don’t want to buy anything, cuz it is a rental and therefore not permanent, nor ours. Enter Miya Designs. I’ve talked about them many times, and will continue to talk about them. They not only sell amazing stuff in their boutique type store (in Syracuse, UT), they also have very talented designers that completely design houses, rooms, whatever. No, they aren’t sponsors, they’re just awesome. I got 4 quotes on carpet to replace the ugly green carpet in our house that we’ve been trying to sell for 2 years (*sigh* don’t even get me started)

See the forest green carpet? Anyway, out of 4 companies, theirs was the best quote, lowest price, fastest service, and nicest looking carpet. This is how my house looks now. (note I paid for this. I’m not getting anything from Miya Designs, seriously. Just love them)

Oh, man it lightens things up so much! So, I love Miya Designs. Back to my house project. I went by Miya’s and they were having a HUGE sidewalk sale. It was insane. Like, I’m glad I came for one thing and actually stuck to my budget type sale. They had all sorts of remnants that they couldn’t use after their design projects, so really nice fabric was CHEAP. I got some sheer fabric that I was buying, and it was originally $100 a yard. What the?!? I got it for a few cents. Seriously. Crazy talk. So I used this upholstery fabric from Miya’s to make some new pillow shams. I just put it right over the current pillows, so less feathers poked out and jabbed my arms. (anyone else get that with down?)

Isn’t it pretty? I’m not a HUGE blue person, but I think this is really nice and works with our rental. Have you ever made a simple envelope case for a pillow form? Super easy. First measure your pillow. Add 1” to the measurements, and that’s how big you cut your front. I added 1 1/2” since I didn’t want them to be super snug, and not go over the other cases easily. So, if you’re doing a 15” pillow, cut a 16”square. Clear? For the back, you want an overlap and 2 pieces, I go with a 3” overlap, generally. So you divide your number in 1/2, and add on your 1” (for seam allowance), and then another 3”. So with a 15” pillow, you divide in 1/2 for 7 1/2”, then add on 4 to get 11 1/2”. You can go with a nice even 12” just to make it easy, if you so desire. So you’d cut 2 pieces of fabric 11 1/2” (or 12”) by 16” and you’ve got your front and back. Next, if you want, you finish the edges. At least finish the edges of the 2 edges were the overlap is. Unless you happen to cut that on a selvage, which one of mine was.

Notice how I zig zagged along the edge? Now, press those 2 back pieces over 1/2” on the long side. So you’d press over the 16” long side.

This was a selvage cut piece, so I didn’t have to finish it. After you’ve pressed them over 1/2”, sew along as close to the raw edge as you can, so about a 3/8” seam.

Do you see that? Now, before I confuse any of you, I decided to do 2 pillows with the blue outside, and then 1 with the brown, just because I liked the contrast. The brown is really scratchy, but it looks pretty. Next step is to sew your pillow together. Line up the corners, Pin everything down, and make sure you overlap the back pieces. I like to back stitch over the overlapped part a few times just to make it nice and secure.

Once you’ve stitched all the way around your pillow, you’ll want to cut the corners. Yep, you are cutting corners peeps.

This helps your corner be nice and poky. Turn it inside out and iron everything nice and flat (poke your corners out with a pencil or something somewhat sharp)

And then put in your pillow form and you’re done!

I only recovered 3 of the pillows, because they were the exact same fabric as the couch, so it helped break things up. Plus, 2 of the pillows are suede, so nice and soft It was a subtle, not huge difference, but it’s made me feel more at home in my rental.

I also made a fun circle pillow to go on my rocking chair that actually is ours. Little touches make a home, right?