Sewing Winter-Themed Envelope Pillows
Me and my children love Christmas and everything involved with it. So normally we would go nuts and decorate the house with everything Christmassy we could find. Unfortunately, we’re living together with the Grinch aka my husband. Not only does he hate Christmas, but he also hates everything decoration. So each year we’re trying to find a compromise which usually looks like a small Christmas tree and some seasonal pillow covers. I think the pillowcase idea is quite neat since the covers can be changed according to the season or event to give the home a subtle festive vibe.
This year I hade to make some extra pillowcases since my mother will be selling handmade things on a Christmas market.
The absolute pro argument for those pillow covers: they only need 10min max. If you’d like to use the same motifs to appliqué onto the pillow, visit our shop, we have a printable for each version.
The size of the fabric piece depends on the size of your pillow. In our case, we have pillows with a 40x40cm size. You can calculate the size as follows:
Width: Width of the pillow + 2cm seam allowance (1cm for each side)
Length: 2x length of the pillow + 22cm (layout: 3cm seam + 8cm overlap + ½ length of the pillow + 1x length of the pillow + ½ length of the pillow + 8cm overlap + 2cm seam)
It looks quite difficult and more like a math problem than a sewing instruction. If you also have a 40x40cm pillow you can just hop over to our shop and get the printable that can be used as a pattern.
If you want you can add an appliqué, a print, an embroidery whatever makes you happy.
Before anything you need to mark the front of the pillow and the fold over lines. Fold the piece together, short sides on top of each other. Now measure from the middle of the piece on each side half of the length of your pillow. Those are the fold over lines and the are in the middle is the front of the pillow, where the embellishment should be. If you are using one of our printables you just have to transfer the lines on the pattern. We love to use magic vanishing tailor’s chalk to mark lines like that.
Put the fabric piece in front of you, right side facing up. If you made an embellishment, this should be facing you. Now take the top edge and fold it down along the top fold over line. Do the same thing folding the lower edge up along the lower fold over line. Pin all the fabric layers together and sew them together. You can use the serger for this step. We prefer to use the normal machine and finishing off the raw edges with a zig zag stitch.
Turn the pillowcase inside out. Pay special attention to the edges. Now put a pillow and that’s that for this project!
Check out our printables in our Shop.
Have fun decorating your home!