ottoman cover

Now I know you all think I'm a deadbeat Crafter. I havent published a tutorial since well August. But I'm back in action. Heck I even have a new recepie for you but I'm waiting on photos. And I have a give away going on. Also before I get bashed on my photo taking abilities I have an excuse. 1. its been raining all week and the sun was not cooperating. 2. the lighting in my new place is well awful. 3. maybe just maybe I wanted to give it a 70's vibe okay?!?!? So bear with the photos and ill try to get up some better ones of the finished project once the sun shows its smiling face once more.

Ottoman Cover

So I have this

Yes its a card catalog that I got for FREE. It is now converted into this...

And This is the tutorial so you can make an ottoman top for a piece of furniture you might want to transform.

Materials needed
Sewing machine
Scissors or Rotary Cuter
Thread
Pins
Pencil
Glue if you make boo boo's like me
Bread knife or if you have a electric turkey cuter it will be quicker
Marker
Foam: you pick a size
Fabric: you pick how much of what
Accessories: ie ribbion or buttons or whatever you want to decorate with.

Lets get started with that lovely green foam (did I mention foam is expensive I mean like this one piece was almost $30 yes I chocked when I went to the fabric store)
So for my ottoman I wanted it to fit inside the little lip at the top so I measured the inside of the lip which came to about 31 3/4" x 17". So i got a piece of foam that was 32"x24"x5" I wanted it to be extra thick. From there I had to measure out my square. I decided to skip trimming off 1/4 inch because it just seemed like a waste of my time. So I measured out the 17" and marked off with a pen.

Now this is your new best friend. Be nice to her be kind and most of all Be CAREFUL she is sharp!

You now get to cut down as straight as possible and remove the excees foam

Or you can be like me and not cut so straight...its okay just cut off some extra foam and glue it into the holes. No one will notice its going to be covered anyways!

Next up Iron your fabric so its nice and pretty. I have used a linen here because it was the only thing I could find in mustard yellow but you could use anything cotton to drapery whatever floats your boat.

Lay the fabric down on the ground and place your foam on top place it close to the edge but leave enough room for a 1/2" allowance. Trace the foam on the fabric.

I swear there is pencil mark but here is a photo that i added the pencil mark to be more dramatic.


So from there you need to cut a 1/2 inch seam allowance from the outline you made. I used a ruler and rotary cutter if not go ahead and use a ruler and draw the seam allowance and cut out shoule measure 32 3/4" x 18" .

Next the sides of the ottoman pieces. Now this is a little trickier and math is of the utmost importance. Now for the sides. You need to take these measurements from the piece of fabric you cut which should now measure 32 3/4" x 18". For the 32 3/4" side you want to add 1" to it for a 1/2 in seam so 33 3/4". Rember also you have to account for the 5 inch height of the foam so I went ahead and added 1 1/2" to that to make that 6 1/2". So you will need two of these pieces and the measurement is 33 3/4" x 6 1/2 inch. Now for the shorter side you take the 18" and add 1" to make it 19" and again account for the foam height of 5" by adding 1 1/2" to make it 6 1/2". You need to cut 2 pieces with those measurements of 18"x 6 1/2"

Now you want to lay it out like this so you can see the visual.

You want to pin the sides down so the right sides are together and sew with a 1/2 inch seam. Please note you will have overhang on the sides of about 1/2 inch which we will use later to sew the perfect corner. You want to sew right to the end of the piece but not onto the over hang. And make sure not to sew it down to another edge.

Once you have all the pieces sewn together get the trust iron out and iron flat.

Now lay it down and get to accessorizing ive decided to use some brown ribbon (note I had not yet realized how much my ottoman was starting to look like charlie browns shirt). I just laid it out and pinned it down and then sewed into place. You can do something like this or embroider the top or add decorative stitching.

Well your almost there you did some math (trust me not as bad as the geometry I made you do for the sleep over sac) and your about to make some perfect corners! This is probably the trickiets part for me just trying to explain how to do this but it will all come together i swear.

so when you lay the corners flat with the right side facing you you should have something like this.

now what you want to do is take the top part where my had is and pull it towards you like so

you should then be able to match up the edges and sew them down. Make sure you start right at the seam you put in to attach the pieces and go straight down with your 1/2" seam allowance.

Now turn it right side out and you have dare I say a pretty perfect corner (i should have pushed it out more because it was perfect!) Repeat on the other three corners.

Your all done now slip it over that ugly green foam and place on top of whatever you are transforming. You should have an excess which can be folded under you can pin it glue it whatever you please i just shoved it under and into the lip of the card catalog and WHOO HOOO I have an ottoman (this is when I realized my ottoman was charlie brown themed).