Tutorial: Modern Accent Pillow

I've been envisioning this project for a while and finally had a chance to make it!  I wanted another accent pillow and wanted to use a reverse applique technique with a little hand stitching detail.  Here's how it turned out!

You can make one too if you want.  It was super easy to do!

What you'll need:

1/2 yard solid fabric for front cut into an 18" square (Or I used a dinner napkin)

1/2 yard fabric for back cut into an 18" square

1/4 yard patterned fabric for reverse applique

1 skein coordinating embroidery floss

needle, scissors, freezer paper

1. Cut out circle from freezer paper in the size you'd like your applique to be.  These are 4 1/2" in diameter.  Iron onto your fabric where you'd like the cutouts to be.  (I'd also keep your pattern about 2 1/2" from either side as the sides of the pillow will shrink a little bit when it's stuffed and we don't want your applique on the side.)


2. Trim around your freezer paper pattern to cut out the circles from the main piece.  Pin your fabric underneath and line up how you'd like it to show.  Hand stitch a running stitch around the applique circles to hold the fabric in place.


3. Place your finished pillow front, and back of pillow together with the right sides facing each other.  Stitch around the edge using 1/4" seams and don't forget to leave a 4" opening along the bottom to turn and stuff.


4. Stuff with my favorite stuffing: Cluster Stuff from Wal-Mart.  One bag of this will stuff 3-4 pillows!  (Don't forget to clip the edges before your turn right side out to stuff.)  After you've got it all stuffed, hand stitch the bottom closed and place in your favorite spot.

(For this Pillow I used fabric from the City Blooms Collection from Benartex)