Before and After #3

A dear friend handed a bunch of lovely pillows down to me several years ago.... and I'm feeling the need to refresh some of them, and this is the first one I tackled:

I wanted to re-use the cording or welting for the edges, so I ripped it out as I took off the cover...

I was unpleasantly surprised to find this lump of smushy "fill" inside the pillow!  In order to help the new cover have a smooth look, I covered this "filling" with the remnant of a much-loved crib sheet.  I measured the old cover and used it as a pattern for both the insert and the new cover...

I also made my own bias tape to cover the piped edges of this pillow (from scraps I had from my little lady's pleated crib skirt), following this method (without the folding/ironing step).  (I'm not 100% sure that bias tape is really necessary.  It's a pain to make!  Yes, I do understand the theory, but.... before I knew I was "supposed" to use bias tape, I just used a rectangle of fabric and clipped the edges of any curves, and it worked like a charm!) I used the old casing as a pattern to know how much bias tape I needed for my new piping.

I created my piping and sewed it into my cushion cover (you can read about one way to do this here), turned my cushion cover right-side-out, stuffed it and sewed up the open side nice and tight. :)

 

Here is the finished pillow, along with a sneak peek or two of some of  upcoming projects.....

Lovely, spring-y and refreshed. Ahhhhhhh....
Now what is going to happen to this messy couch?? 

Here is a super-secret-sneak-peek of its "before."  It's an Ethan Allen couch and it cost $15 at a yard sale.  Now let me just say that if a picture could carry a smell, you'd never come back to this blog!