First up was re-recovering this little footstool.
If you remember, I'd originally recovered it with dropcloth material and a freezer paper ink transfer. But once I'd bought the turquoise/yellow chair from Target, the beige & brown just didn't match. When I was cleaning out the linen closet I found an old set of curtains that were nearly the same yellow as in the chair. They are a rough, almost-dropcloth-like material too.
I was planning on just folding over the material at each corner and stapling it under, but after several dozen tries I couldn't get it to lay to my liking. So I sewed the corners down the same as I did the first time I recovered it. This time I also added a little seam on each top edge by folding the material over and sewing a thin line (hem?) No real reason for it, I just thought it'd be fun.
The stool is still a little plain looking. I think I'm going to make a stencil of one of the ikat patterns on the chair and paint it on to the top of the stool.
The second project was a new dog bed. I love making dog beds. They are so easy, and they make the dogs happy. There's nothing I like more than making my dogs happy.
This entire project required no new materials. I used two old blankets, a waterproof fitted sheet from Goodwill, and a curtain panel from the As-Is section of Ikea that I had in my fabric stash.
Little Dog (Sasha) has been having some minor incontinence problems lately (we're trying a change of diet and homeopathic drops to see if it helps), so we've had to throw out a few dogs beds. You can wash a cover, but there's only so much you can do for the bed itself. And we have an abundance of old blankets that we aren't using anymore.
I folded the two blankets into the size I wanted and sewed the corners together to keep them from sliding around. I removed the elastic edging from the fitted sheet, folded the sheet over, and sewed up two of the sides to make a sleeping bag shape. This crib sheet is wonderful because it's a nice quilted fabric on the outside, but plastic on the inside, so even if she does have an accident, we can remove the cover and the sheet, wash them, and the blankets still stay dry.
The open edge of the "sleeping bag" closes with buttons, much like a duvet cover. I couldn't get the button hole setting to work on my sewing machine - I think because the plastic layer of the sheet kept sliding - so I "freehanded" some button holes just by sewing-turning-sewing-turning to make rectangles. Not bad, if I do say so myself.
I then sewed buttons on the opposite edge. Here we have it with the blankets inside and the buttons done up. I like it already.
The outer cover is a loose weave charcoal curtain that is so very soft. The plan was to sew it in an envelope style so that the interior section could be removed easily. Unfortunately the material is so stretchy that the center kept gaping open. So it was more buttons. I sewed them on the inside of the top flap and then just pushed them through the fabric on the bottom flap. The weave is so loose that I didn't have to make button holes.
The finished product is kind of whomp, whomp. It's okay for now, but I think I might remove the buttons and add velcro later. Or take out the stitches and just make it a standard cover with a zipper.
Chloe is very much in love with it, even with all its flaws. She wouldn't stop laying on it, at every level of construction. In fact, after sewing the outer cover, I left it on the floor to go get a snack, and came back to find this:
After I kicked her off she sat beside me to watch. This bed wasn't getting out of her sight.
I'm pretty sure Sasha isn't going to even get a chance to pee on the new bed. I might have to make a second one.
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