Have you ever heard of upcycling, FPgirls? Upcycling is kind of like recycling, but cooler. Instead of throwing something out you save it and then turn it into something awesome! Here’s an easy upcycling project you can do after you clean your closet: a tee shirt pillow! 

What you’ll need:

  • A Tee Shirt - Maybe it’s a little too small but you still love it, or it’s a souvenir from a place you had a lot of fun at but you don’t really wear it. Any tee shirt that you’re not going to wear but you still think looks cool.
  • Scissors
  • A needle and thread or a sewing machine - Ask a parent for help with the sewing machine!
  • Stuffing - You can use pillow stuffing from a craft store, more tee shirts, an old towel, or any other soft material you aren’t using.   

How to do it: 

  1.  Lay your teeshirt out flat on a table. Make sure it’s not bunched or wrinkled anywhere.
  2. Chose what size and shape you want your pillow to be. It can be a square, a rectangle, or a circle as long as you can fit it on the tee shirt and you leave at least an inch of space around any graphics you want to be on the pillow.
  3. Draw your shape on your tee shirt. You can use pencil or a piece of chalk to do this, or a thin marker. Hint: use a ruler or something with the same shape you want to make your lines straight.
  4. Cut out your shape. Make sure you keep both sides of your tee shirt together while you cut it so you end up with two pieces.
  5. Separate the two pieces and flip them over so the outsides are facing  each other. It might help to keep them together with pins.
  6. Sew almost all the way around the pillow, leave about half of one side un-sewn.
  7. Flip your pillow right-side-out again and fill it with the stuffing you chose.
  8. Finish sewing the last part and voilà! You have a new, unique, DIY pillow!

Have you ever made a pillow or upcycled something before?  Is there an upcycling project you want to learn how to do? Let us know in a comment!

Want another tee shirt project to do? Check out this DIY knotted shirt purse. :)