Frugal Animal Beds

With four cats and two dogs, I always have animals laying around.  Seriously.  They're just laying around all over the place.  In the past, I've spent money on animal beds, but oftentimes, they were cheap material that couldn't stand up to washing and I need to wash them...a lot.  I needed a better, but still frugal solution.  Two rag towels, an old floor pillow, and twenty minutes later, I had a fully washable dog bed.  It turned out so well that I wanted to make some more animal bed covers, so I headed to Target and bought their $3.50 bath towels and made two more.  (The rag towels worked well, but I didn't take pictures.)  Here is how I did it:

We just use old pillows for animal beds.

Lay one towel on the floor.  Lay your pillow on top of the towel, closer to one edge of the towel.  Leaving the same amount on the opposite edge, cut off the excess.  Don't discard as you'll be making an envelope closure for this pillow.  (Great tutorial on envelope closures here.)

Lay the pillow you're using on one towel.

Now, pick up the pillow, but leave the portion of the towel that had been under the pillow in place.  Take the piece that you've cut off and lay it on top of the towel, matching the cut-edge to the outside edge of your towel.

Putting the finished edge on the inside makes this a quick project.  Your

envelope folds are already finished.

Now you'll take your second towel and cut it to a length that is one half the width of your pillow and lay it on top of the other two pieces of towel that you've already cut, making sure to put the finished edge on the inside of the pillow, just like you did with the second piece.  Pin all three layers together and sew around the outside edge. 

Sew all around the edge...in some places you'll be going through three layers

of towel...just be sure to catch those inside edge.

Flip your pillow cover right side out and insert your pillow.  Lay it on the floor and see who gets it first.



Cat bed?

Dog bed?  Either way, this one is in Buttercup's room now.



Well, either way, cat or dog, it is an animal bed that cost $7 and twenty minutes to make.  It is oh-so-washable.  Just what we need in this menagerie!

If you don't have a serger, you can just zig zag the edges.

Oh, and you'll have extra toweling.  I cut mine into squares, serged the edges, and got myself a bunch of new washcloths.  Not bad for $7!!