Now, I was sure I was not the first person to come up with this idea. In poking around on the internet I discovered that this has also been described by Martha Stewart. I am sure other people have come up with it as well. However, I still feel excited about the results.
I already had a throw pillow I no longer care for that would work for the smaller of the two shirts. For the larger shirt I used a pillow insert that I found by the dumpster...
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| One of the shirts and the old pillow I covered (not the dumpster pillow). |
Whoa, back up, did I just say I took a pillow from the dumpster?
It really isn't as bad as it sounds, I swear. It was put aside with a pile of very nice stuff that somebody was giving away because they were moving and it was very clean. I checked carefully.
First, I laid each shirt over the correct pillow to figure out how to piece the pillow cases together. This can be the tricky part of the project depending on the size of the shirts and how much salvageable material is left.
For the larger pillow I had to be a bit creative to create a piece large enough to cover one whole side. This was accomplished by cutting the strip with the buttonholes off the front of the shirt and sewing it to a rectangle of fabric from the back of the shirt. This didn't really leave enough fabric to cover both sides so I used some nice quality striped white cotton (really just an old sheet).
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| Front |
I am in love with the finished product. The blue stripes coordinate with the blue of our bedspread perfectly and the pillows are fun and pretty without being too feminine. The buttons are decorative but also functional since they serve as the closure for the pillow making it is easy to remove the pillow case for laundering.
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