New Menswear slipcovers for my front room

Here is a pic of me with 2 of my 3 sisters at my Cabin sledding on Christmas Eve....Well not really sledding, just watching the kids sled...my two sisters are pregnant. Anyhow Angie and Nikki are both amazing photographers and probably cringe at some of the pictures I post. Angie is hosting a giveaway for me on her blog for my slipcover DVD...so go check it out.

 With my time off I finally got to finish my $10 bench for the cabin that I picked up at the thrift store.


Now on to my real post....MY NEW SLIPCOVERS!!!! I am in love. I picked up this grey/brown/menswear looking fabric at Home Fabrics in Orem for $4/yd. I bought 25 yds and gave my room a new look. I had my other slipcovers on for about 5 years...I was ready for a change.

 Here is the couch...I eliminated the gathered skirt and let the legs show. I also made the cushion cover a little bit looser, so the down would look squishy and comfortable.

 Here are the loveseat legs

I made some new pillows for the white chairs. The other day I stopped at REstore, which is a habitat for humanity thriftstore for building materials. They happened to have a shopping cart filled with fabric samples from Hancock Fabrics. They were 10/$1 so I bought 50 of them. The center fabric is one of those samples. I have plans for some turquoise/brown menswear, cream/ turquiose herringbone, and cream velvet pillows for the couches to go with the chair pillows. But with the new slipcovers I am actually loving the red more, so I am going to leave them this way for a little while.

In the meantime I am making a footwarmer for my bed out of 24 of those samples...I already have it pieced together, I just need to put a back on it and sew some piping around it.

Another shot of the loveseat.

I am loving the darker fabric compared to the tan I had before...hopefully it will hide more of the kids foot footprints.

I am loving my pillows more now.

White linen napkin pillow.

 Couch

 Here is a close up of the fabric...tiny specks of tan woven in with the brown/grey. I love it, kind of adds some texture.

 Front of the arm

Here is one of the owl pillows I made for my boys out of my grandpas old shirts. I utilized the pocket for the front...they write notes to eachother and they can put their lost teeth for the tooth fairy in the pocket. You can get the pdf pattern here.

My grandpas name was written in the neck of all his shirts, so I used it on the bottom of the boxing. More nostalgic for me than my boys... my oldest was 3 when my grandpa passed away.

Whole room put together. I also found a lap quilt that Hebers Grandma made for each of the grandkids before she passed away....and draped it over the couch arm...it had the greys and reds in it. I decided to use and display it rather than leave it tucked away nicely in the trunk. She made it out of her husbands old suits.

Front room before

Here is a shot of my old set of slipcovers and pillows. Still cute, but I was ready for a change. See how different the couches look without skirts???

Another DVD tesitmonial/ chair redo

So I opened my email last night and recieved an email that made my day...just thought I'd share.

I am just about done with my new slipcovers for the front room....let me just tell you I am in LOVE!!! I just have two more cushions and I'll be done. I decided to change it up and eliminate the skirt and show off the legs. The fabric is kind of a menswear dark grey/brown. It makes my pillows look a ton cuter. I'll post pics when I am done. Anyhow onto the email that made my day.


Shelley,
I have to tell you, my hopes were pretty high when I ordered your DVD. I've just a marginal hobbiest, but for some reason I was really believing your DVD would answer all my questions. And, guess what??

IT DID!!

I loved your presentation, your thorough instructions and tips; I even appreciated your music selection. Your simple style and straight-forward approach really make me believe I can sew one of these dang things! I felt like you were just my neighbor and you were helping me with a project.

Now, I can't wait to get my Bernina tooned-up, find some fabric and some time and tackle my crazy sectional!

Thanks so much!


Here is a link to my sisters blog that shows sledding pics at the cabin....click here

I know you all like to see pics and not just read words, so here is another before and after. I know the driveway isn't the best place for pics...but I do what I can.

 Chair before

 Chair after...she chose this darling yellow and cream print. She decided to go with a smaller piping than normal probably 1/8", and I actually liked it alot. There was no seat cushion so tuck in around the seat and I did piping and a band around the front of the chair.

 Here is the upper back, you can see the smaller piping here and the darling print. I saw this print in red a long time ago, but I absolutely love it in yellow.

 Side view

Showing the band along the front...and yes I matched up the stripes.

White Slipcovers

I hope you are all enjoying the holiday season. I've enjoyed the time off and have sewn quite a few things for my boys in my spare time...footballs, football pillow cases, owl pillows out of my grandpas shirts from a tutorial that my sister found  at  sewing republic blog. I've also made a few purses for gifts, I got the inspiration from theboytrifecta blog. I even bought fabric yesterday to redo my front room slipcovers...hopefully I'll have some time next week to get them done before I start back to work.

Don't think all I have done is sew with my time off. We have been to the cabin and the boys are working on perfecting their sledding run. We went and saw the lights at temple square. We've been to some holiday parties. We are heading to the firestation tonight to have Christmas dinner with Heber since he works on Christmas. I've been out running the neighborhood in the snow...all bundled up of course.

Tomorrow we are celebrating my baby sister's birthday at the cabin...sledding, hot chocolate, and my famous chocolate cake (tip...undercook your cake by 3-5 minutes, it may sink and look ugly, but it will be super moist and yummy and a huge hit!). She was born on Christmas Eve. I still remember being about 5 years old and my dad taking us to the hospital on Christmas day to meet our new sister. I think it was different back then, I just remember my dad holding me up to look through the window to see my mom holding Nikki. Happy Birthday Sis!!

Anyhow onto the slipcover makeover.

 Here is the before of the room. My client had already slipcovered these couches before and had removed the back cushions that were coming off already. She replaced them with big Euro pillows. She decided to go with a white denim and will probably add a chair in black and white ticking stripe after the holidays and the christmas tree is gone.

 Before of the couch...when cutting off the back cushions, cut outside the seam so you still have fabric covering the springs. If you unpick the original seam holding on the cushion, you'll be left with a huge hole and exposed springs or batting.

 Here is the after, we threw a couple pillows on from the bedroom to add some color until she gets her pillows made.

Another after shot

You can't go wrong with neutral slipcovers...you can always change your look with pillows.

red/cream slipcovers

 My client picked these items up from a yard sale... $30 each for the chairs and $100 for the couch. They had attatched cushions on the back, so I cut those off and covered them separately.  She was able to find the cream jaguard/matelesse fabric at Home Fabrics for $6/yd. It was beautiful to work with.

She used red denim for the couch. We made arm pads for everything to help with the wear. When I make arm pads I put piping in them along the front to make them look like part of the chair.

I thought these were perfect for the holiday season. She was still going to make some throw pillows to pull it all together.

Here is a close up to show the cream fabric. It washed up well.

I saw this dog pillow in one of her other rooms and loved it, so I threw it on the chair. It's wool hook looped. I thought it went well with all her new slipcovers.

Here's the ottoman as well. Yard sale finds can be great!

Holiday pillows for my front room

 So I decided to get into the holiday spirit, I decided to make some new pillows for the front room. IT's all about the pillows...that's what I always tell my clients, you can completely change your whole look with just the pillows. That's why I like to keep neutral slipcovers and then when I am itching for a change, I make new pillows.


I found a quilt that my dad gave to me 13 years ago when I got married. It was made by his grandma Hamilton, a pioneer quilt. I thought it worked great with what I was doing, so I draped it over the back of the loveseat.

My little guy really wanted to be in a picture...he even smiled for me.

Close up of great grandma's quilt. I made the red pillow with 2" strips of bias (fabric cut on the diagonal) and sewed ten rows across and gathered it as I went. I love ruffling bias, because you don't need to hem the edges. I decided to sew the ruffles on with tan thread instead of red to make it a little more rustic.

I was kind of feeling the menswear, and I had a small scrap of this brown houndstooth to make a rectangle pillow. I love to mix masculine with a little bit of feminine...something a little unexpected. The white pillow is made out of a white linen napkin that I sewed burlap strapping down the center and then I decided to ruffle some 2" brown bias down it to tie in the brown and darker colors. I backed it with a bold brown/red stripe, so I can flip it if I choose to mix it up a bit. You can see the back of it a few pics up.

 I always joke that the reason I like ruffles so much is because I have three boys. I can't put them in ruffles, so I wear ruffles and decorate with ruffles.

Featured on Remodelaholic

Today Cassity over at Remodelaholic featured my front room slipcovers...go check out her blog and all the awesome projects over there.

Green Damask chair

This is the second time I've done this chair for my client. This time she decided to go with a green damask fabric. It turned out great, I was able to match the seat cushion with the main body repeat.

Before

After

Close up to show the repeat from the cushion to the main body. The pattern matched up well and could be centered on the seat and back and flow together.

close up showing the front of the arm

close up showing the scroll back on the chair, I just continued piping up and along that curve as well and down the back. The piping also went down the inside arm to underneath the cushion.