"Put a Bird on It"

For Christmas I got some spending money from my grandparents. I decided to use that money to re-decorate the living room a bit. My big "redo" was the couch area. That's changed from season to season. It was first some coffee mug paintings I did (the big painting at the end!), then some Clemson decor for football season, then I wrapped up two canvases in Christmas paper for the holidays. So at the beginning of this month it was time for something new.

I went shopping at this big home decor store in town to find something that I liked. I didn't really have any ideas going into the store and figured I'd work from whatever I found. Well...this is what I found...

I loved the bird design. I found the middle one first and happened to stumble upon (actually literally, I tripped a bit on the display!) the two outside hangings. 

Walking around I also found this...which was PERFECT to go with my new wall hangings.

I thought it was adorable. Not to mention that total for the 3 wall hangings and the lamp shade I spent about $45. WIN! Everything was on sale for 50% off. DOUBLE WIN!

Next I knew I needed pillows to match. Something brown...and with a bird on it. But when I looked through the pillow section, while they had HUNDREDS of pillows, there wasn't anything there I was willing to spend the money on. 

So it was craft project time. 

I bought 2 yards of this pretty brown material that I found at Wal-mart for about $7.50 total. I already had a beige fabric so that was free (woo!). I also bought some iron-on adhesive (fusible webbing) for attaching the bird shapes to my pillows ($3 at Walmart). 

First I measured and cut the material to make the pillow cases...well actually they're more like shams...the kind that you have to sort of struggle to get the pillow in but the material folds over and meets in the middle of the pillow. I just used the pillow as my measuring guide, nothing fancy. I cut it so it'd be long enough to wrap around and wide enough to cover the pillow. I include extra so I can sew everything up. 

Next I sewed the top and bottom edges down. These are the edges that you'll see. Next I drew out my bird pattern. I just free-handed it, but you can use a pattern or stencil if you like! My first mistake was cutting out my first bird and the trying to iron the webbing on. Let's just say...today I'm going to pick up a new ironing board cover. If you use the fusible webbing, iron on a patch of material first then cut out your design. If you read the directions on the fusible webbing it's really easy to use. Just actually read them so you don't end up like me! 

After I ironed on the bird, I used my machine to stitch the outline. If you're really interested in doing things like this Google applique! There's TONS of tutorials and useful blogs out there. After the bird was applied and sewn, I just sewed up the rest of the sham. 

And ta-dah! 

Here's a close up of the bird (you can see the stitching around the bird):

And here's everything all put together:

I'm a fan. It feels all cozy. And it's definitely different from what I've had before but it still ties in with the rest of the apartment.

Hope you all enjoy!