Fall Leaf Pillow

I love a good pillow! This year, I was inspired by several really cool looking fall leaf pillows that I found on Pinterest. (Which, by the way-I have a Sweet Home Indiana Pinterest page that you should really check out!)

Originally, I had thought about cutting out my own leaf shapes from felt, but I then I found some beautiful fall felt leaves at Hobby Lobby. They were perfect for what I had in mind! I also got a 16x16 linen-esque pillowcase and pillow insert from Hobby Lobby. I am all about making it easy! I am also all about making it cheap as I had to go back on three separate occasions so I use coupons on them. When you are a baller on a budget, you do what you gotta do!

I was unsure of what to use to attach the leaves to the pillowcase. The leaves are actually pretty thick and sewing them on just didn't seem like it would work. I decided to glue them and started researching what would be the best glue to use when gluing fabric to fabric. After doing quite a bit of of research, I settled on Aleene's Fabric Fusion. It said it was permanent fabric adhesive, which was exactly what I wanted.

How could you not love these leaves!

My cleaned and pressed pillow case along with the leaves and glue.

I used a cardboard insert from a box of kleenex to make sure that the glue would not bleed through the pillowcase and end up gluing it shut. You learn things like this from trial and error!

First things first, I arranged the leaves in the design that I liked best so I knew where to glue them. Also, notice that I put the zipper on the bottom of the pillow design. There's nothing worse than getting finished and realizing you put everything on upside down! Again, trial and error!

I put a moderate amount of glue all over the leaves and pushed them down with my hand for about a minute to get the glue to start setting before I went on to the next. I also started putting heavy books on top of the glued leaves once I got down the line, so it would help them set up as well.

After letting the heavy books sit on top of the pillow overnight so that everything would really stick, I was so excited to see the finished product! I lifted the pillowcase up to admire my work and a leaf fell off. Of course, that lead to me picking on the others and a few more fell off. I have to admit, I was pretty devastated. I had such high hopes! It was supposed to work perfectly! I have no idea why after all this time crafting and doing other home projects, I always think that everything is going to go smoothly and turn out perfectly. It rarely does!

Never one to give up easily, I re-glued the leaves while cursing Aleene and her stupid glue. I made sure to push down even harder and put even more glue on. After letting them dry, I checked it out again. Success! No leaves fell off this time. I forgive you, Aleene. Excitedly, I jammed the pillow insert into the case and thought, "Hmmm...this looks different than I had imagined."

The finished product. It really does look good. I just had not anticipated that the leaves would be so....not in the middle? Busting at the seams? The middle looked very plain to me and the leaves were further on the edges than I thought they would be when I designed the pillow. But that is life, it rarely turns out how you imagine.

Looking good on my antique rocking chair. I actually love how it ended up turning out. It looks pretty awesome if I do say so myself!