DIY Pet Pillow: Chihuahua

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I have been wanting to make a Chihuahua shaped pillow of my mom's dog, Buster, as a gift.  

Materials needed:

1) A good quality photo of the pet/animal you'd like to use

2) Iron on transfer paper

3) Ink Jet printer

4) Sewing machine (or you could sew by hand)

5) needle and thread

6) material

7) Iron and some type of heat resistant hard backing (wood cutting board/piece of wood)

8) Poly fill

Step 1:

Prepare your image.  I used Photo Shop to add Buster to a white background and clean up the edges of his outline.  Then, I sized the image to best fit my transfer paper.  You may have to create a mirror image of your image but in my case, it won't matter which way he prints onto the paper.

Step 2:

Make sure you have enough ink in your printer.  You may want to print out a test print in order to make sure your image will fit the page the way you want it to.  Once you are good to go, add your transfer paper to the printer so that your image will print onto the unmarked side of the transfer sheet.  The ink must dry for 30 minutes before you can transfer it.  Now you may trim the image to your desired shape.

Step 3:

Iron your fabric smooth if need be.  Preheat your iron for 5 minutes to the highest cotton setting.  Do not use steam!  You will need to put your fabric over the heat resistant hard backing such as a wood cutting board.  You can't use an ironing board for this step.  Place your image face down onto your fabric where you want it to be.  Iron over the entire image using a circular motion making sure entire transfer, especially the edges, receives 15 to 20 seconds of heat.  Now, you may remove the transfer paper's backing.

 

Step 4: 

Trim your fabric to your desired pillow size.  Put the fabric with right sides facing in and sew around the edges, leaving a section a few inches wide open.  Now turn your pillow right side out and stuff with poly fill.  Finish by hand sewing the remaining opening.  Now you are finished!

Original inspiration pin came from go make me:

Source: gomakeme.com via Monica @ Creative Gator on Pinterest