A few months ago I saved an idea I saw on Facebook for future reference. It was simple DIY sewing instructions for a child’s portable bed; perfect Christmas gifts for my grandchildren. These will be great for sleepovers or just lounging around watching a movie. This past week I tackled the project and it (thankfully) was as easy as promised.
The most difficult part was finding cute and colorful pillow cases suitable for a young girl and boy. Although the instructions advised to use pillow cases for the whole portable bed and simply sew the cases together, I decided to improvise a bit and purchased themed twin sized sheet sets. My granddaughter loves pink, purple and rainbows, while my grandson is fixated on cars…
I used the pillow cases for the heads and the flat sheets for the large portion of the beds. I saved the fitted sheets to take to the cottage for the (real) kids beds there. Although the instructions suggested a pillow in each section of the body, I (improvising again) used rectangular pieces of foam. To hold the foam pieces in place, I folded each flat sheet in half long ways and sewed “pockets” into them. The pillow case was a guideline to figure out the width of the pockets, with an inch added to each one.
I figured the flatness of the foam and the added inches between each section would make it easier to fold each portable bed up for storage when not in use…
I did use (standard sized) pillows for the heads as suggested. The beauty of this project is that the pillows and foam can easily be removed to wash the casings.
Here are the finished products, ready for use. Pretty cute if I do say so myself! I’m sure my grandchildren will gets lots of use out of them, hopefully at my house!
