The temperature has dropped here in New England and the need for hygge has gone up. It’s the time of year, when we cozy up our homes with plaid pillows, plush blankets, fluffy socks, hot chocolate, and Hallmark movies. Curling up on the couch feels so good when the wind is blowing and the snow starts to fall outside. (Yes, we had a few flakes this week.). It’s time to cozy up your home with homemade Luxe plaid pillows.
Two of our kids went off to college this Fall, but still come home every few weeks. They come home to rest and relax. They enjoy a few home-cooked meals, sleeping in their own beds, and relaxing in our living room. It makes me so happy to know they find comfort here.
Since they left for school, I’ve been trying to make little improvements to our home, so that each time they come back, they have a few little surprises. I organized our study and moved some furniture around, painted a cabinet and replaced an area rug in our front entryway, painted a wall, repaired a damaged wood floor, refinished the tops of four benches, removed some old furniture, and added some cozy plaid pillows to our living room.
Two years ago I removed the canvas Restoration Hardware pillows from our living room. I loved the style, but they were starting to come apart at the seams and really weren’t very soft to lay on. Since then, I’ve been in search of softer pillows that coordinate with our living room.
Fabric colors and patterns are hard for me. I can refinish and paint furniture and walls, but when it comes to coordinating more than two colors and patterns in a room, I sort of freeze up. And, since there’s a slight pattern on the curtains in our living room, I found it hard to bring in a second and third fabric with pillows.
When I walk into a store, my senses get completely overwhelmed. I would rather shop in a smaller store with a few options then shop in a huge furniture or clothing store. My senses go into overload, I can’t make a decision, and as a result, I walk out without ever purchasing anything.
Our living room in intentionally monochromatic. There’s nothing in here to distract my senses. Instead, I can walk into this room and completely relax.
No, it’s not a black & white room. The walls are a medium gray. The area rug is a natural flax. The wood is a warm walnut. The sofa is a dark gray-green.
That’s not to say I don’t have color in my home. The study where I’m sitting writing this is a dark green and bright white. Our 2nd floor where the bedrooms are are primarily navy blue and white. Ooooh…. forgot to mention, I’m also working on updating the kids bathroom. Nothing major – just a new shower curtain, cabinet hardware, artwork, and towels to surprise them. It hasn’t been updated since we moved in 18 years ago!
Squirrel! Sorry. Back to the plaid pillows…
My point is I’ve been working to make our home even more welcoming, calming, and a place my kids ALWAYS want to come home to. The same feeling I still get when I go to my parents house.
As much as I don’t like to shop, I’ve been online and to a ton of stores looking for pillows for our living room. I love red plaid and green plaid, but really had a hard time disrupting our monochromatic, peaceful living room with such bright colors.
Add to that, our sofa is an unusual color and really doesn’t coordinate well with most red and green plaids. When we purchased this sofa from Crate & Barrel years ago, the soft fabric was called “smoke gray”. It’s really a dark green, sort of a blue-gray-green, but it also has a touch of olive when the sun shines directly on it. I absolutely love to cozy up on this dark sofa, but it is difficult to find fabrics to match.
Instead, this week, I went to Joann Fabrics (with my sofa fabric in hand) with a plan to make my own pillow covers. Joanns seems to have stepped up their game over the past few years. I found a Luxe fleece fabric that I’ve never seen (or maybe just never noticed) there before.
This Luxe fleece is a really low-pile fleece (unlike the thick fleece I’ve made the kids’ blankets from in the past). The Luxe comes in a range of beautiful plaid patterns ranging from scotch plaid, buffalo check, extra-wide, and mica patterns. You can see some of them HERE.
It was here at Joanns that I found two plaids that perfectly coordinated with our gray-green sofa! They’re actually gray and winter white but blend to look more green when against the sofa, so they coordinate perfectly.
One is the Tan & Heather Plaid, the other is the Buffalo Check Gray.
To make these four 18-inch pillows, purchase 1-1/4 yards each of the two fabrics. The Luxe fabric comes in 53-inch wide width. Here’s a quick run-down on how to make them:
- Lay the fabric on a table (right side up) and place the two 18-inch pillow inserts on the fabric.
- Fold the fabric over the pillow inserts (so the bright side of the fabric will be inside. When you do this, one side of the pillow will be on the fold and will be finished (you won’t need to sew it).
- Trim the fabric evenly down the center so you have two different pillow covers.
- Set the pillow inserts aside and pin the left and right side of each of the fabric pieces into place, then sew them on the sewing machine.
- Turn the fabric right-side out and insert the pillow.
- Now you’ll have one side of the pillow cover that is still open. Fold the fabric in, pinch the two folded edges together, and hand-stitch to close the entire open edge.
These pillows turned out better than I had expected. This Luxe fabric is more luxurious than I had expected. It’s incredible soft and cozy. And best of all, the color and patterns blend with my living room rather than feel like they bring in a busy pattern. My senses are incredibly happy.
You can find plaid pillows on Amazon here:
Or, on Wayfair here:
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.
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