I must be on a roll, this month, because this is the second chair cushion post you’ve seen. Holidays are great for getting little projects like this done and checked off my list. Recovering this chair cushion required a sewing machine and a little thinking ahead, but it’s pretty easy, even if you can barely sew. And it took under an hour to personalize this seat cushion.

My little one reminded me that last Thanksgiving was when I ripped up the carpet and pulled down the wallpaper for her big girl room makeover. Whew. This project is quite a bit less involved.

The chair from my daughter’s SmartStuff Furniture set is lovely, but I wanted to make it fit in with her pink, pink, and more pink theme. But I’ve carefully layered several pinks, and leaned a bit towards coral to keep it a teensy bit sophisticated. I found this cute fabric shower curtain on the sale aisle at Target in just the right shade. Shower curtains, curtain panels, and cloth napkins are great for makeover projects at home. You might have seen my cloth basket liner project a while back, which uses a tablecloth for inexpensive fabric.

Here are the steps to turn a shower curtain into a chair cushion cover.

Using the existing cushion, we traced a pattern using a sewing pencil. Do this on the “wrong” side of the fabric. I used a 1″ measurement for the seam, even though I knew that would be generous. With the angles and curves on this piece, I wanted a bit of wiggle room.

To make double sure that we had the right measurement, I took the stuffing out of the existing cover, which has a zipper enclosure. Double-checking our outline, we knew we had traced a good pattern.

We pinned the top and bottom of the fabric together, and then cut out the 2 sides of the pattern. The “right” sides of the fabric are facing each other inside. There was no pattern that we had to match up, thankfully.

Here the little one is demonstrating where we will sew the seams. I started at one of the back corners, and sewed a 1″ hem around the front and all the way to the other back corner, leaving the very back side open.

After three sides were sewn, I stuffed the original seat cushion from the chair into the back opening. At that point, we just needed to add some ties and sew up the back. Here’s where we totally cheated. We cut the finished edge off the shower curtain, and trimmed it right up to the factory seam. Both girls helped.They are 7 and 9 right now, pretty much the perfect age to learn to sew.

Inspecting the original cover, we determined the best place for the ties, and I hand sewed them to the back corners.

We talked about doing an envelope flap like I did for these pillow covers. We also talked about Velcro and a zipper. But in the end, I just hand-sewed the back of the cushion cover.

I don’t sew enough to have perfect seams, but it’s good enough for rock n’roll.

Now, instead of a plain Jane neutral seat cover, we have something with a little je ne sais quoi for this Paris-inspired room.

It looks like a million bucks, but only cost about $5. Plus, I have tons of fabric left over for the girls to use in a doll project or two.

I hope you are inspired to break out your sewing machine and complete a fun little project like this. If you do, you might want to organize your sewing kit a bit. Here’s one of my favorite tricks to keep the sewing box organized. Use a binder clip to keep your measuring tape neat and organized. Love those binder clips!