ruffle pillow tutorial

i just got back from a great trip visiting my family in missouri and kansas, so i've been a little scarce this last week.  i also started back to work this week, summer break is over...  but i still have lots of projects on the horizon and almost finished my summer list!  so here is the long ago promised tutorial for the ruffle pillow i made this summer.  it was a much more involved process than i had planned, not difficult, just lengthy!

ruffle pillow tutorial
you need:
1 1/2 yards of fabric
dental floss
string
pillow stuffing 
sewing machine


1.  start by cutting two squares of fabric an inch larger than you want your finished pillow to be.  i went with 19 inches.

 2.  cut strips of fabric that are the pillow's length and a half (so mine were about 30 inches long).  depending on the size of your pillow, you can decide how wide the ruffles should be.  you can also do them longer if you want your pillow rufflier (is that a word?).  i cut my strips five inches wide so they would stick off the pillow about 2 inches after being sewn on.  i hemmed the edges by folding them over twice, ironing them down, and sewing them which left me with a 4 inch wide strip.  i used 7 strips, but again, this depends on the size of your ruffles and the size of your pillow.

3.  there are many ways to gather a ruffle, i tried just doing two parallel baste stitches, but my thread kept breaking, so i found a dental floss trick that worked very easily!  set your sewing machine to a zigzag stitch as shown.  then you just lay the dental floss down the middle of your strip (doesn't have to be perfect) and you zigzag stitch over it, leaving the floss running down the middle between the zigzags.  make sure the dental floss is a little longer than your strip before you sew.  after you have sewed the zigzags, you can pull on each end of the floss and slide the fabric to gather it.  you've got ruffles!

4. now you're ready to sew your ruffle on.  take one of your fabric squares and place the ruffle where you want it.  i didn't even pin it on because i didn't want it to look to straight and measured.  i sewed right down the middle of the ruffle where the dental floss is on each ruffle and made sure i didn't leave too much space between ruffles so it looked full. 

5.  once you have your ruffles like you want, lay your two squares together and pin the sides.  be sure to lay the ruffles face down since you'll be turning the square inside out.  stitch around the edges leaving 6 inches or so open so you can turn the square inside out.

6.  now all you have left is to flip the pillow inside out so the ruffles are on the outside.  stuff it to the fullness you want with filler and then i folded over and sewed that last six inches closed on the machine.  all done!

if you make your own pillow, please link it up so i can see your work!

yum.  i had been wanting to try a few new recipes during my summer break and i haven't done as well as i was hoping because paul just wants to eat leftovers for dinner so he can eat his precious peanut butter and jelly for lunch.  foiling my plan!  anyway, i made this spinach ricotta pizza from cooking light and paul rated it a 9 out of 10 which is super rare!  it was pretty easy and so fresh and summery.  

i finally picked a color for our bedroom and after two hot, arizona afternoons of slapping paint on the walls, it's done!  i love it, it's like warm sunshine on the walls... a forever reminder of how hot it was when i painted in here.  i had to take down the blinds, so the sunlight was streaming in full blast and my a/c would not keep up. 

paul hadn't trusted me to pick a color he liked, but he also wouldn't give me any input besides, "just leave it white."  ho hum.  so when he first saw me painting this color, he didn't like it because "it's yellow."  by the time i finished, he was surprised that he actually like it.  point for me.

i haven't gotten much up on the walls yet, i'm still trying to decide on what i want to put in there.  let me know what ya think! 

i can check another thing off my list!  i made sarah a flannel baby blanket, the first i've ever made.  i found this super easy tutorial at abmatic and while i loved the bold and off beat fabrics she used, i couldn't find any like that which were also gender neutral!  it was easy to find great fabrics if i knew it was a boy or a girl, but no go.   so i think it still turned out pretty cute and hopefully sarah's as of yet genderless baby will love it!  it gave me an idea on another style of baby blanket to try for the arizona climate for another friend.   i'll post it when i get around to it.

painting my craft room wasn't on my list of things to do this summer, but it is taking me awhile to decide on the color i want to paint our bedroom.  i knew exactly what i wanted to do with the craft room, so i painted it on friday afternoon and love it!  just what i wanted. 

i have been selling quite a few of my vintage style necklaces so i tried a new color and really like it.  it's so sunny and light.  it's for sale at my etsy shop!

what do you think?  should i try some other colors too?

i have three weeks of summer before i head back to work.  one of those weeks i'll be visiting my family in missouri.  so i figure i have two weeks left to make my summer wishes come true.  here's the list of projects i started the summer with:

*finish my painting- a big painting i started has been sitting there for about a year waiting for me to take a day to finish it off

*paint the eiffel tower- and by that i mean, paint a sketchy black outline on a white background.  simple... easy...  hopefully.  after our trip to paris in the spring i've been longing for a good picture.

*make throw pillows for the new bench- done!  i always like to put things on my list that i already did to make me feel better.

*cook some new recipes- i haven't had time to cook in ages and i'm ready for some new stuff.  so far i made my mom's chile verde for the first time and some crock pot mac and cheese.  yum.

*paint the bedroom-

*make a paper wreath- check!   :)

*create my oasis on the new patio- plants, wind chimes, etc.

*make a baby carrier wrap and some baby blankets for my newly pregnant friend, sarah.

*finish these books:

wish me luck!

i wanted to post earlier, but i'm at a resort in tucson this weekend for my husband's work.  a fancy resort.  so fancy that internet is $10.95 for 24 hours!  so i found a sweet spot in the hotel lobby where the internet is free and here i am. 

the last few days i was working on some fancy throw pillows that i'd had in my head for awhile.   this one i had seen at pier 1 and it was quite a project.  it wasn't hard but took a long time, so i'll post a tutorial soon so you can learn from my mistakes!

then i had seen this photo and loved the idea, but i'm not big on bows, so the purple one is my version.

i lined up the pillows where i wanted them on this great bench that paul's mom got us.  i showed paul and he said, "i really like the green one you made the best because it's flat and won't get all in my face."  of course, that is the only one i didn't make... i got it at world market...  but he's too practical for his own good so i'm not too highly offended! 

it is amazing what i can get done when i don't have to go to work!  my summer break officially started friday, and after a great camping trip, i'm ready to get back to my crafting, blogging, and relaxing.  things had been hectic with classes, work and a move, but now i'm feeling a bit more settled and my new house is in need of some craftiness. 


after searching high and low for my glue gun, i found it, next to the bottle of honey i'd also been searching for.  in the closet in our workout room....  then i set off to work on this wreath i had been wanting to make for months.  the original tutorial is here at living with lindsey.

and today i feel like sewing...   hmmm....

i've been busy at work this week getting ready to move into a new house, but i did manage to fit in some crafting!  my friend just adopted two little boys, a 14 month old and a 14 day old,  and she needs the hook up with some cute things.  she agreed to be my guinea pig, so i made her a baby wrap carrier and this mobile.  it  was hard to get a clear picture of the mobile because those birds wouldn't hold still....  hopefully i'll get a pic of my friend in that wrap with her baby soon!