Pin Pillow Tutorial #2

Here is the 2nd pillow tutorial resulting from my finishing spree last weekend:

You will need:

• Stitching for the centre of the cushion
• Coordinating fabric(s) for side strips and backing
• Sewing machine with coordinating sewing machine thread to match your fabric(s)
• Scissors/rotary cutter and mat
• Pins
• Embellishments (optional)
• Polyfil stuffing (or something similar)
• Sewing needle and thread to close up the seam opening

1. First of all cut your coordinating fabric into equal width strips, and approximate width of your sewing project. In my case I have chosen to have two different fabrics on the front of my pillow, and have started with a narrow strip of bright rust fabric for the inner border.

Pin the first strip with right sides facing to your stitching (I prefer to start with the pieces attached to the left and right sides, but you may prefer to start with the top and bottom sections first), and stitch a normal seam allowance (alternatively you may prefer to just a quilters 1/4" seam).

Once you have stitched the first seam, attach the 2nd strip of fabric to the opposite side of your stitching and stitch another seam.

2. At this point I cut off my excess fabrics on each side, and trim my seams to 1/4" - I usually prefer to do this because I don't trust myself to get things right the first time!

3. You finish with nice tidy edges, ready to attach the last two sides of fabric.

4. Before we do that, though, we need to open the fabric sides up and give them a quick press with the iron so that they sit nicely. If you want to you can also do a row of top-stitching to assist with holding the fabric nicely, but I don't normally bother.

5. Now we attach the top and bottom sides in exactly the same way as we did with the first two sides. Once all sides have finished, I normally check the side strips to ensure they're nice and tidy and even, and if not I give them a quick trim all round with the rotary cutter.

6. In my case I decided to just have a narrow strip of bright rust fabric as a contrasting focal point, then added some wider strips of fabric for the outside edges. These are attached in exactly the same way as the rust strips, they are just cut into wider pieces. You just need to remember to add the next lot of strips in the same order as you did previously, which was in my case left and right first, followed by top and bottom. Once I had ironed my finished strips I decided that little buttons would be nice in the corners, so I added these before adding the backing fabric.

7. Now you need to cut your backing fabric the same size as your finished article, and pin them together with right sides facing together (the right side of the stitching will be on the inside of the sandwich).

8. Stitch a seam allowance around the edges, but leave an opening at the bottom so that you can turn your pillow inside-out. I tend to leave about 1 1/2" opening and that's normally enough room to allow for turning.

9. I use a chopstick to help push the corners into a nice shape from the outside - you just have to be careful not to force the seam stitching too much! Once you have turned your pillow inside out, it should look something like this. Now all you have to do is stuff it to your preferred thickness with your favourite stuffing.

10. I close my pillow openings with a ladder stitch - and the following is taken from a previous Christmas ornament tutorial, but is the exact same instruction for closing the pillows.

You need to thread your sewing needle with sewing thread (if you didn't leave a long tail from the seam stitching). You should use a sharp needle here, not a tapestry needle, so that you can pierce the backing fabric easily.

I use a ladder stitch to sew up the opening. As you can see from the left-hand photo below, I start off by slipping my needle into the seam of the backing fabric, then coming back out about 1/4" along the seam (about 3mm) and bring my needle out.

I then take my needle directly opposite where I just came out of the backing fabric and slip my needle into the linen and follow the seam along for about 1/4" (3mm) and bring the needle back out again.

I've left the stitches nice and loose in the photo below to help illustrate how the stitches follow along opposite each other, like rungs of a ladder.

When you pull the thread tighter, the stitches almost disappear into the fabric, giving a really nice clean finish - this is definitely my favourite stitch for closing up openings for that reason!

Once you reach the end of the seam opening, you need to finish off your thread with a couple of teeny stitches - I then bury the needle into the seam and come out somewhere about an inch way and bring the needle back out again - then clip the thread close to the fabric so that my thread tail does't appear easily.

And here's the final seam all finished off - see now nice and tidy that ladder stitch is in the opening? :D

11. And that is the final step in your beautiful new pin pillow coming to life. Now all you need to do is to find somewhere to display it where it can be admired by everyone :D

I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial, and found it useful. I would love to see any photos of ornaments you've completed using this tutorial so please do drop me a line or leave a comment with a link to your pictures :)

Pin Pillow Tutorial #1

Here is a pin pillow tutorial that I put together during a day of finishing last weekend - I finally managed to sit down and put the instructions together today.

You will need:

• Stitching for the centre of the cushion
• Coordinating fabric(s) for side strips and backing
• Sewing machine with coordinating sewing machine thread to match your fabric(s)
• Scissors/rotary cutter and mat
• Pins
• Ribbon/lace/button embellishments (optional)
• Polyfil stuffing (or something similar)
• Sewing needle and thread to close up the seam opening

1. First of all trim your stitched piece, and cut your coordinating fabric to your preferred length and the approximate width of your sewing project. In my case I have chosen to have my coordinating fabric at the bottom of my stitched piece, and I prefer to have the quilting fabric slightly smaller than my stitched piece so it doesn't take too much attention from the stitching - I have, however, seen some stunning pillows with the stitching taking up just a small amount of room at the top of the pillow. The only difference is down to your preference, as the finishing process is exactly the same.

2. Pin the fabrics together, with right sides facing, and stitch a normal seam allowance (alternatively you may prefer to just a quilters 1/4" seam).

3. At this point I cut off my excess fabrics on each side, and trim my seams to 1/4". This is also the time when you should open up the seam(s) and give a quick pressing with the iron.

4. If you have decided to have fabric on both sides of your stitching (either top and bottom, or left and right) this you will need to repeat the above process a second time for the additional piece of fabric. Once you've finished attaching the coordinating fabrics, check the edges to ensure they're all even, and give it a quick trim with the rotary cutter if needed.

5. At this point I add any seam embellishments to the pillow front. For this particular pillow I just wanted to add one row of matching ric-a-rac. This can either be attached by the sewing machine or by hand (I ended up adding this one by hand, as I didn't have a matching brown sewing machine thread). This is also a good time to add any buttons or other trims you want to add, prior to constructing the pillow itself. Alternatively, you can add your ribbon at the very end once the pillow is finished, but just wrapping it around the pillow and tying a bow to hold it in place :)

6. Now you need to cut your backing fabric the same size as your finished article, and pin them together with right sides facing together (the right side of the stitching will be on the inside of the sandwich).

7. Stitch a seam allowance around the edges, but leave an opening at the bottom so that you can turn your pillow inside-out. I tend to leave about 1 1/2" opening and that's normally enough room to allow for turning.

8. I use a chopstick to help push the corners into a nice shape from the outside - you just have to be careful not to force the seam stitching too much! Once you have turned your pillow inside out, it should look something like this. Now all you have to do is stuff it to your preferred thickness with your favourite stuffing.

9. I close my pillow openings with a ladder stitch - and the following is taken from a previous Christmas ornament tutorial, but is the exact same instruction for closing the pillows.

You need to thread your sewing needle with sewing thread (if you didn't leave a long tail from the seam stitching). You should use a sharp needle here, not a tapestry needle, so that you can pierce the backing fabric easily.

I use a ladder stitch to sew up the opening. As you can see from the left-hand photo below, I start off by slipping my needle into the seam of the backing fabric, then coming back out about 1/4" along the seam (about 3mm) and bring my needle out.

I then take my needle directly opposite where I just came out of the backing fabric and slip my needle into the linen and follow the seam along for about 1/4" (3mm) and bring the needle back out again.

I've left the stitches nice and loose in the photo below to help illustrate how the stitches follow along opposite each other, like rungs of a ladder.

When you pull the thread tighter, the stitches almost disappear into the fabric, giving a really nice clean finish - this is definitely my favourite stitch for closing up openings for that reason!

Once you reach the end of the seam opening, you need to finish off your thread with a couple of teeny stitches - I then bury the needle into the seam and come out somewhere about an inch way and bring the needle back out again - then clip the thread close to the fabric so that my thread tail does't appear easily.

And here's the final seam all finished off - see now nice and tidy that ladder stitch is in the opening? :D

10. And that is the final step in your beautiful new pin pillow coming to life. Now all you need to do is to find somewhere to display it where it can be admired by everyone :D

Following are some additional pillows I have finished in the same way - isn't it amazing how such a simple finishing method can look so different depending on the choice of fabrics and embellishments?

Pillow Finishing Tutorial

Now that you have your supplies gathered, we are ready to start making a pillow!

All of these instructions are written to create an envelope style cover to put over a pillow form. However, if you only want to make a small pillow, you could leave off the large border. If you want to stuff your pillow instead of using a pillow form, you would make a one piece back and leave an opening to turn and stuff your piece. The basic principles are the same, so you should be able to modify to suit your needs. Personally, I do like to make the envelope style pillows and use a pillow form. This eliminates storing bulky pillows, and allows me to switch out the covers with the seasons.

The first thing that you need to do is draw out your dimensions. I strongly suggest that you don't skip this step if you are planning to use a pillow form! (Even though I drew mine out, I still messed up...hence the delay in getting this posted...and an unplanned extra border around the edge).

You will need to decide how big your finished pillow should be. That will drive all of the other measurements. I used 0.25" seam allowances throughout this project. I used a 14" pillow form, so the size of my front piece needed to be 14.5" x 14.5", which is the 14" finished size plus 0.25" seam allowances all around (to allow for attachment of the back panel).

Here is what my diagram looked like:

Here is how I figured out the finished sizes and cut sizes:
Section A - Stitched Design Area: My stitched design size was 4.0" x 4.0". I wanted to leave a 0.25" margin around my stitching. I allowed 4.5" x 4.5" for the design portion (4.0" stitched area + 0.25" margin on each side). The cut area needs to be 5.0" x 5.0" to allow for the above finished size, plus a 0.25" seam allowance on all sides to attach to Section B.

Section B - Narrow Border Area: I wanted to have a 1.0" border all around the stitched area. The cut size of the strips for this area needed to be 1.5", which is the 1.0" finished size, plus a 0.25" seam allowance to attach to Section A and 0.25" seam allowance to attach to Section C.

Section C - Wide Border Area: This area is flexible based upon the finished size. The total width and height of the front needs to be 14.5" as discussed earlier. This measurement includes the 0.25" seam allowance on each side to attach to the back. The finished size of this area will be 14.5" total minus 4.5" (A) minus 2.0" (B on two sides) divided by two (top, bottom) = 4.0". The cut size for the strips in this section needed to be 4.25". This is for the 4.0" size just calculated, plus 0.25" to attach to Section B. The seam allowance to attach to the back was already taken into consideration when calculating the 14.5" total size of the front.

Hopefully that all makes sense. Draw yourself a diagram, and calculate carefully. Be sure to do your finished size calculation first, and then do the cut size calculations.

Now that you have your diagram finalized, it's time to get down to work. First, we'll cut the stitched piece to the correct size. I like to do this by pulling threads to make a visible cutting line. This ensures that you are starting with a nice, straight edge. Measure 0.5" from the top edge of the stitching. The 0.5" is for the 0.25" border, plus the 0.25" seam allowance. Pull out the horizontal thread closest to 0.5".

You could also count threads rather than measuring. For example, if you stitched your piece on 28 count, you would count out 14 threads and pull out the 15th thread. Repeat all around the piece. Cut out your piece using space left by the pulled threads as a guide.

Cut your strip of fabric for Section B, using the cut size width that you calculated for this section. Don't worry about the length. When I cut my stips, I just cut the appropriate width of fabric and for the length I went from selvage to selvage. One strip was plenty.

Cut your strip of fabric for Section C, using the appropriate width that you calculated for this section. Again, cutting from selvage to selvage gave me plenty of length.

Iron your stitched piece and your strips of fabric. The good news is that the hard part is over, and we're ready to sew!

Start at the top of your stitched piece. Pin the right side of your Section B strip to the right side of your stitched piece. Cut off any excess length even with the edge of the stitched piece.

Sew a 0.25" seam. Repeat at the bottom edge of your stitched piece. Iron the seams open.

The front of your piece should look like this:

Attach the Section B strips to the sides. Iron your seams open.

The front of your piece should now look like this:

Repeat the steps to attach the Section C border. Your piece should now look like this:

Important! Measure your piece, and make sure that it is somewhat close to what you calculated. I messed mine up, because I had forgotten about the seam allowance to attach the front to the back. I had to sew a little strip all of the way around, so in the following pictures you will see an extra brown border. I wasn't thrilled about this, but it turned out okay. Now is the time to make any corrections, if you miscalculated.

Cut your back pieces. You will need two pieces. The width should be the same as your front. The length should be about 70% of your front. Hem one edge of each of the back pieces. I like to use the selvage edges for this, and fold up about an inch and sew it down. If you don't have a selvage edge to work with, you will need to do a double fold and sew it down.

Lay your front piece face up.

Lay one of your back pieces face down on top of your front piece. Line up the unfinished edge of the back piece with the top of your front piece. The hemmed edge should be towards the middle of the piece. Pin.

Lay the other back piece on top of your front piece, lining up the unfinished edge with the bottom of the front piece. Your two backing pieces will overlap. Pin.

Sew all of the way around the piece, using a 0.25" seam allowance.

Turn right side out.

Insert your pillow form into the "envelope" opening in the back. Stand back, pat yourself on the back, and admire your finished pillow!

If you have any questions, please contact me and I'll try to help :)