Monogrammed Outdoor Pillows

Monogrammed outdoor pillows

     For Christmas this year I made my daughter and her husband some pillows for their outdoor furniture that we bought them for their new house.

Cutting the bias fabric to cover the outdoor cording

     I chose Sunbrella fabric and weather resistant pillow forms.  I bought it all from Online Fabrics.  The idea is that they should bring them inside but in case they get left out and it rains, they should still hold up.

Matching the stripes on the bias cut fabric

     I bought coordinating solid and stripe fabrics.  The smaller pillows were made with the solid with the striped covered cord and the larger pillows were the stripe with the solid covered cord.  I also used an outdoor cording for the pillows.

Trimming the monogram fabric in the hoop

     I cut the cording covering on the bias and matched the stripes while sewing the pieces together.  I used an appliqué monogram from Designs by Juju, the Wanda font in the 7-inch size.  I stitched them onto the smaller pillows using a slightly different part of the stripe on each one.

Smaller pillows with appliquéd monograms

     I carefully assembled the fronts with the covered cord and the backs with the lapped zipper near the bottom.  The small pillows went together just fine.  The striped ones however were a different matter.  I had made sure to mark the top of the stripe as I cut the pillow pieces so they would all be oriented the right way.  What I forgot was that to match the stripes, the back piece actually had to be upside down.

Matching the stripes on the front and back

     I really didn't want to redo either the front or back and not having the stripes match would really bother me.  I opted to sew the front piece on upside down, thus the join of the covered cord was on top.  That to me was the best solution, especially as I was sewing these the day before our get together.  Nothing like last minute pressure.

Larger striped pillows

    They really liked the pillows and I'm not sure they even noticed the join at the top of the pillow.