#OxCoPAL's Winter Pillow Project #4

Hi Everyone!

You ready to make a pillow? Here we go! 

So, to begin with you will need a fat quarter of whatever you are using as your pillow backing. Here we used a creamy wool. A fat quarter will provide you with two equal parts that together will make the perfect envelope backing for your pillow.

Once you have this, you are ready to start rolling. We have a wonderful tutorial on creating an evelope pillow backing for your OxCoPALs Winter Pillow Project. Amy also has step by step instructions on making an envelope pillow backing in her book Punch Needle Rug Hooking: Your Complete Resource To Learn And Love The Craft. Below the video, you can find more step by step instructions. 

To begin with, you will want to cut the 18" x 28" fat quarter in half to get two 14" x 18" pieces.

Once you have done that you are going to take one edge and fold it down creating a seam of 1 inch. Pin, or use wonder clips, the whole edge in place. Do this to both of the pieces of fabric.

Using a sewing machine, sew that edge in place. 

Now, you are going to want to make sure that you are working on the pillow with it in reverse, so inside out. Make sure as you are laying the pieces down to pin into place, the unfinished side of the wool is facing up, and the loop side of the punched pillow is facing up. 

Lay one piece of the wool a little over half way down the pillow, about 2/3 of the way with the newly hemmed edge at the top. Next, lay the second piece so the hemmed edge is again 2/3 of the way across the pillow, overlapping the other piece. (See the picture above.)

Pin the center in place before pinning the sides. After you have pinned the middle, go ahead and pin the sides as close to the punched edges as possible. Once everything is pinned in place, you are ready to sew the pillow together. 

When sewing this, you will want to make sure that you the have correct tension set up on your sewing machine. You will also want to hold the pillow at an angle so that you can get the presser foot and needle as close to the punched edge as possible. Hold it at an angle with your hand or your arm as you move the pillow through the sewing machine. You will want to make sure you are doing a backstitch at all beginning and endings, just to make sure your stitches stay in place. Once you have gone the whole way around the pillow once, you will want to switch to the zigzag stitch and leave about 1/4 of an inch space from the seam. Sew around the pillow once again. This is to keep the monk's and the wool from fraying too much and damaging the pillow you have worked so hard on. 

You will want to cut the excess pillow backing off of the pillow before turning it and finishing it. 

Once you have that all done, you can go ahead and turn the pillow right side out.   You aren't quite done yet though!