for the birds

easy pillow cases

I got this fabric on sale at our last trip to Ikea. I’d been wanting to cover my bulletin board with something, and this seemed perfect. I’m a fan of avian themes, and the neutral color palette and simple line work tone down the somewhat busy pattern. So, while it’s always hard for me to tear into a piece of fabric, I cut it in half, trying not to decapitate any birdies, and tucked it into the frame of the bulletin board with a piece of cardboard for neat edges. It’s held in place with rows of flat white thumbtacks. And now I have a prettier way to organize my papers. Those former clementine crates on the desk help too.

Aaaand I had enough left over to cover two throw pillows. Thanks to my great love-affair with iron-on hem tape, this took about 15 minutes.

fabric covered boxes

pretty boxes

Now that the blister on my index finger from the glue gun has finally faded, I figured it was time to post about this project.

It’s definitely my kind of craft because:

A) it takes about 5 minutes.

B)it reuses something i already had but would have tossed

C)it gives me an opportunity to use up those abundant fabric scraps i can never seem to part with.

For Christmas, we got some yummy cookies from the bf’s mom. Thanks! They came in some festive red and green boxes adorned with snowmen and Santas. Not exactly the kind of thing you want to keep year-round, but I have a hard time parting with useful things like boxes (ok I have a hard time parting with everything…). So I spray painted them white, which in general is a good first step for anything you’re not sure what to do with. Since it wasn’t the greatest paint job, my next step was digging around in my scrap pile to give them a little more pizzaz. I just whipped out the glue gun, roughly measured and cut some fabric (stiff cotton/linen works well), wrapped it tightly around and folded it into and under the boxes. Just like wrapping a present. Speaking of which, these would make great re-useable gift boxes! I left the lids white because I like the contrast, but you could wrap the whole thing or even use different fabrics.