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The Muppet Tuffet


A smiling lhasa apso with a short coat and a blue harness, laying down on a rectangular bed with a navy-and-white print cover.
Featuring a blueberry she rejected, after following me around hopefully for several minutes.
This little monster is actually very well-trained, and as she keeps spending more time at my house, I thought it was time she had her own bed. As well as being handy for sending her somewhere specific (rather than "Settle! No not there, over—wait no, not there either, wait, come here..."), she likes having a spot that's all her own.

A folded turquoise comforter, a stack of similary-sized pieces of yellow foam mattress topper, and a crumpled piece of navy-and-white print fabric on a rug with splashes of the same colors.
At the moment my entire life is beautifully color-coordinated.
Because I'm constantly getting into new and exciting hobbies (like home ownership), I am constantly a little bit broke on the "fun stuff" side of the budget, but I am also constantly surrounded by supplies (like foam mattress topper remnants and too-torn-to-donate-but-too-intact-to-throw-away comforters) that can be turned to unconventional uses (like dog beds).

A tall stack of alternating layers of turquoise and green comforter and yellow foam mattress topper, dwarfing the multicolored rope chew toy in front of it.
Kinda Princess and the Pea-ish.
Because most of my dog experience leans toward the extremely large—the foxhound currently puttering around my parents' house, baying at everything that confuses him (that would be...everything) is the smallest dog I've known—I had ambitions of fitting three layers of foam between the layers of comforter.

You may be able to tell by the scale of the rope toy that this was excessive for the dog in question.

A sandwich of turquoise and green comforter and yellow foam mattress topper, with a multicolored rope chew toy in front of it.
Much better.
So I reined in my ambitions a bit and tried just one piece of foam sandwiched by comforter. It's still a bit tall, but I knew I'd be tufting it as well as making a washable cover for it, and both of those would help to squish it down more.

A white hand stabbing a very long needle into the corner of a folded turquoise comforter.
I love stabbing things.
Tufting means I get to use the giant stabby needle that came with my mattress!!! I love stabbing. That's why I'm a seamstress.

I also used as much as I could of some old crochet cotton I've been slowly working my way through for tufting thread. It seemed like a sturdier option than any of the sewing threads I have, and I've also had the tiny remnant ball kicking around for years now. (It's still not gone. Maybe I'll use it to tie up some plants or something.)

A frankly confusing image, with two white feet pressing down on a turquoise comforter while a white hand pulls a pair of teal thread ends up, crossing them as if to tie a knot.
OSHA violations everywhere.
Turns out no matter how long the giant stabby needle is, eightish layers of comforter and one of memory foam is a lot to ask it to go through cleanly. I figured out that pressing down on the stack with my feet to force the needle (braced on the floor) back up between them was most effective, if not exactly safe.

Feet were also instrumental in tying the tufts tightly enough to do their job, as two hands to pull two ends of thread and press down a stack of fluffy stuff are not enough.

A large rectangular pillow, loosely wrapped in navy-and-white print fabric, with folded-back overlapped edges on top and a small pair of scissors nearly vanishing against the allover lacy circle design.
I've never actually made an envelope pillow cover.
I inherited this piece of fabric from a friend who moved out of state (to a friggin mountaintop paradise, what the heck?! Hi, Honeyed Homestead!). It got elected to make the cover because it's sturdy cotton and I'm pretty sure it's been prewashed (hmm...that might come back to bite me). Also, it's in the top stratum of the stash, so minimal effort was required to retrieve it.

A white hand pushing a needle through a large folded-over hem in navy-and-white printed fabric. Up close, the design looks like interlinked compass roses.
Super lazy handsewing.
True to form, I handstitched the cover, which didn't take all that much longer than machining it would have. Plus, I got to watch more Good Omens while I was sewing.

A thick, tufted turquoise cushion leaning upright against a tan couch, with a rumpled piece of navy-and-white patterened fabric on the couch seat.
I like bringing weird projects to work just to surprise coworkers.
I figured out the cover by wrapping my hemmed piece of fabric around the cushion, inside out, and pinning the sides and corners until they seemed neat enough. It's a highly scientific process (and actually, I'm not being facetious at all. My sewing is extremely well suited to the Scientific Method where you try things, note their successes and failures, and try new things while taking that information into account).

The cover's just an envelope with a very big overlap to help keep it on the cushion despite canine shenanigans. It makes getting the cushion in and out a bit of a process, but I'm sure I'll get faster at it. I went ahead and did the side seams up with backstitch to give them more reinforcement, too.

A lhasa apso curled up on a navy-and-white dog bed in front of a pair of orange velvet wingback chairs. The bed is framed by the photographer's outstretched legs and feet. She's wearing very dirty jeans and worn brown boots.
Dunno why you're so tired, pup.
A test run suggests that the critter in question approves. I'm flopped on the floor because I'd just spent about six hours loading compost from the city, pulling sod, and generally being a credit to my English blood, out working in the midday sun.

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