From T-shirt to Pillowcase.

Hubby was home for the weekend and wore his hoodie that I fixed last week. He was really pleased with how it was fitting him again and moved on to bemoaning the lack of t-shirts that fit him or weren't falling apart. For some reason t-shirts in Australia seem to be made shorter than the old ones were have from the UK, however, those t-shirts are now well over 12 years old and very well loved and worn.

One particular favourite of his is in Real Tree camouflage, but the collar lost its elasticity and went saggy, so he cut it off. At some point he also cut the sleeves off, not sure why. Either way, he wasn't happy with its fit any more, but the main body of fabric was still in really good condition.

He'd been asking about getting a pillowcase cover for the pillow he takes with him each week and really wants it in the Real Tree material because the white cases get dirty quickly when you're camping.

It's a long story, but he works away during the week and has been camping for over three months because he can't find a rental.

Most of the fabric we have from old clothes would be too small to make a pillowcase without it being patchwork and it's not a great look turning up to work with seam imprints one your face, so we'd ruled that out. Then he looks at his t-shirt and asks if that can be made into a pillowcase. Can it!!

I measured it against a standard pillowcase. The pillows we have are actually a bit large for them, so ideally I wanted it bigger than a standard. Widthwise it wasn't a problem, but lengthwise it was only going to be the standard length even if I could get some extra from the bottom hem.

First thing's first, unpick that bottom hem and unpick the overlocking that held the sleeves on rather than cutting them off and reducing the width.

Then remove the excess from the sides to where the sleeves go in. This should still give some extra width. I had to remove the fabric either side of the neck to level the front up, then the back can just fold over to form the pocket that should hold the pillow in.

Overlocking all the seams minimises the amount lost on them. What would be around a centimetre taken off around the edge becomes about half that, giving a bit more room. As usual I made a mistake and sewed the pocket fold in the wrong way. The default when sewing is usually to sew the right sides facing, so that when you turn it the right way around the seams are inside. However, when you have something a little different going on you often need to do things a little differently and that's always where I get tripped up when I rush things. Luckily it wasn't a huge area to unpick, so it was fairly easily sorted and the pocket went on the inside where it belonged.

With the pocket not being very deep and the length still not quite long enough for the pillow, the pillow keeps popping out. My temporary solution has been to add popper buttons, but I might add an extra strip to deepen the pocket at some point.

^{Glamour shot of the finished pillowcase!}

I know I said last time that I'd be doing visible mending next, but I didn't lie, I have started and hopefully will have the first project finished by next Monday.

~○♤○~

---

You can also find The Miniature Smallholding on:

Instagram
Facebook
YouTube