Ribbon Trim Pillow

I love ribbon trim on pillows. While Greek key is one of my favorite design details it's a little too complicated for me at this point. I decided on a simple border to add to a dropcloth pillow cover. The ribbon was a deep teal 7/8" from Michael's purchased at 50% off for $2.

Now to be honest I attempted this a year ago using one continuous piece of ribbon and hem tape. From a distance or after a few too many glasses of wine it looked okay. But up close it looked like this.

I've washed it a couple times which led to the corner peeling up. And don't you love my um...45ish degree angles? Embarrassing.

Well I wanted to redeem myself from that debacle and this time was going to do it right. I started by cutting a fabric square to cover my pillow form. Then I cut 4 equal pieces of ribbon roughly one inch shorter than the lenth of the fabric.

Two pieces were matched up and I marked a 45 degree angle using a white pencil, ruler and the lines on my sewing matt.

The ribbon was pinned and sewn together on the marked line.

This was repeated three more times carefully measuring where the next ribbon would attach so each side was exactly the same length. I was left with a perfect square which was then pinned onto the dropcloth fabric.

After that it was easy breezy. I sewed down the inside then outside of the square trim taking my time so the stiches were straight. Each edge was then finished with a zigzag stitch to prevent fraying. I decided on an envelope back so 2 pieces of fabric were cut with the one exposed side of each piece hemmed. Then the 3 pieces of fabric were pinned right sides facing together to create a 4" overlap on the back.

It turned out so much better than the first time. With this one I don't have to tell the kids to stop picking at it.

Now there are two matching ribbon trim pillows, just don't look at the one on the right too closely:)

On a side note during this project my daughter asked for a piece of scrap ribbon. 15 minutes later I walked into the office to find this.

All on her own she stapled the ribbon to the edge of a large piece of paper then colored the rest of the blue border with various crayons and markers. She insisted on also making a pillow so we stapled another piece of paper to the back and stuffed it with crumpled scraps. Of course she had to add a smiley face to make it a "Happy Pillow". Here it is after she personally styled it on the couch.

Her pillow making was by far my most favorite part of this project!