pillows of plaid a-plenty

Dave has always made fun of me for my excessive number of throw pillows. In fact, in the last place I had agreed to get rid of some of them by making pillow covers and gifting them to people. Buuuut since we got the house our throw pillow demand has gone up, especially with the fabulous couch we have in the living room downstairs. I'm pretty committed to nesting and decorating for the seasons (we'll see how long that lasts!) so the last trip we took to the fabric store Dave helped me pick out some prints to make pillow covers of our own for the living room. 

He's been big into stags/reindeer the last couple years and there have been many nice prints to choose from lately. We also wanted to try to keep that room more of a red/white/gray Scandanavian vibe for the holidays this year so I kept to that palette for both prints, the backing fabric, and thread. I improvised my way around making a 20" x 20" pillow cover by piecing the front, adding batting, and then stitching those layers together before adding the back. For the backing I used a heavy duty gray canvas that I've had forever. It must have been a remnant I picked up somewhere, but I've got a lot of it! It's perfect for pillow backing and makes the end result much more professional than regular fabric would. 

The zipper was a 16" zipper that I installed with fabric tabs on either side. It wasn't difficult at all to put in and I really like the look of a contrasting zipper showing. The only "quilting" I did on the front was this very appropriate decorative stitch around the center panel that looks like snowflakes when done in white. It adds a touch of whimsy and some texture to an otherwise pretty simple pillow.

It was fun doing a project for the house and also one that was quick to finish. They are installed and being enjoyed by us and the kittens already! Here's hoping we can keep the cat hair off for a while...