Unused Christmas Gift Until Now

A few years ago George bought me a sewing machine.  It was something that I always wanted, but after getting it I thought to myself, "When am I going to have the time to use it?".  So it has sat in the closet for the last few years until this last past Saturday.

My parents were watching the kids over night for us and we had a full 24 hours on our hands to use up.

Oh....the things that you can accomplish when there are no kids around!

George and I had a great morning out together.  We went to the gym, got coffee, shopped, and finished the day with a great lunch.  We then had the afternoon to just relax at home until we had to pick up the kids.

I decided to pull out the sewing machine and make some pillow cases for the play room.  Now, the last time that I used a sewing machine was when I was in junior high;  that is about 22 years ago.  I had no idea what I was doing.  To those who don't think they can't sew, I am proof that you can!

I had these white pillow inserts that have been sitting on our mattress in the playroom for a little over a year and for the longest time, I thought that I would just buy some pillow cases off of Etsy. I was really having a hard time finding something that I liked, so they just sat uncovered.

Here is my sewing machine.  We got it from Costco and while it might not be top of the line, it works for someone that has not sewn before and it is really easy to figure out.

These are the sheets that I had underneath the cover.  I decided to take the flat sheet to make the pillow cases which means a free pillow case. :)

Here is how the bed looked before.  The white pillows that are in the back are the ones that I made covers for.

I made a simple envelope pillow case and by no means do they look great up close, but they work and they are covered.  I was pretty happy with being able to figure the machine and cover the pillows.

Here is the back side to the first pillow that I made.  The second pillow turned out much better.  You can see that I have a bit of a gap on the pillow.  Part of the reason that is that I made it a little too short and the pillows were a bit saggy, so I decided to add a pillow insert that I had on hand to fill the pillows out.

 Here is the finished product up close all put together.

 Because I was so excited about making the first two covers and had an extra pillow insert available, I just HAD to make a smaller one.

I wonder what kind of future projects this is going to spur on??  Here is to the new year and trying new things!