Activity :: Decorate Your Own Pillowcase

The girls are always wanting to do some sort of art & craft activity & I must admit that I've been a bit slack with them lately! There's been a lot of box construction & drawing activities that don't involve Mumma hanging around. But I have missed doing craft activities with the girls, so while Heath slept we got started on designing & decorating our own pillow cases.

All you need for this activity is:

:: Fabric or a ready made pillow case
:: Fabric paint
:: Paint brushes
:: Newspaper
:: Tape
:: Iron
:: Your design - or else you could just wing it

::

:: I had the girls draw their design on a piece of paper before they started(for two reasons - I wanted them to think about what they wanted to paint & also to give me some time to feed Heath & put him to bed before they started!)

:: If you are making your pillowcase from scratch, make sure you mark where your hems are going to go & where the front of your pillowcase ends. I just folded them over & pinned them(don't forget to include enough fabric for that little pocket bit that stops your pillow sliding out of the case).

:: Lay out your newspaper to protect your table, lay your fabric on top & tape it down. This will stop it sliding around while the kids are trying to paint on it.

:: Let them go to town painting their design! 

:: Once the paint is dry make sure you heat-set your design according to the directions on your fabric paint. I had to iron them to heat-set ours.

:: Sew up the pillow case & put it on your little artists bed!

::

The girls were so proud climbing into bed that night & sleeping on their pillow case! Lily couldn't help but giggle when she realised it was her pillow case that she was going to sleep on!



We have a few flat sheets that we don't use hanging around so I cut up one to make the pillowcases. I cut them using the hem of the sheets so that I only had to hem one side of the opening when sewing them up! It takes no time at all to sew them into pillow cases when the kids are done, or, to make it even easier you can just  ready made ones. 

*I didn't include a tutorial of how to make a pillowcase(I just worked out how much fabric etc I needed just by looking at one we already had) but if you'd like one, let me know & I'll post one.