How To Make Letter Cushions

This is a simple craft activity that you can use to dress up a child’s bedroom, or instead of putting their initial on the cushion as below, you could attach them to a shirt in the same way for a cute and personal touch.

You will need:

2 quilting fat quarters* in coordinating fabrics
Stuffing
Sewing machine
Needle and thread
Vliesofix
Computer and printer
Iron

What to do:

Open Word and create a letter to the size that will fit inside a 20x20cm square. If you are concerned about using too much ink when you print out the letter you can choose the outline option and print that instead. Cut out the letter.

Pin paper letter to one fat quarter and cut. Pin to vliesofix and cut. Then iron.

Cut 2 26x26cm squares from one fat quarter.

Remove backing from vliesofix on your letter and pin in the middle of one of your squares.

When you’re happy with the position, iron in place.

Depending on your sewing prowess and preference you can either hand sew using a blanket stitch around the edges of the letter, or you can sew around it using the sewing machine in your preferred stitch.

Pin your two cushion squares right sides together and sew around border, close to edges, leaving a small gap for stuffing. Stuff cushion and close gap.

Using the same fabric as your letter, cut your remaining fabric into 2 rectangles 5cm by the length of the fat quarter. Sew the short edges together. Iron in half.

Open the fold and fold over each long edge to run parallel ironed line. Iron to hold in place.

Pin this rectangle around front outside border of cushion like this:

Sew in place. You can do this by hand as I did, or on your machine. At borders you will need to follow the outside edge.

Now fold over remaining side and pin in place on the back of the cushion. You should try to fold over the corners like this:

Sew.

At this juncture it is easier and neater to hand sew but if you’re a competent sewer you can do this on your machine.

All finished!

*A fat quarter is a one-fourth yard cut of fabric that (usually) measures 18″ x 22″ instead of the typical 9″ x 44″ quarter-yard cut. The longest side’s dimension will vary if your fabric is not 44″ wide.

image resource: quilting.about.com