Pillow Trick

See this sweet little dog?

This is Cole.  Our 3 year old black lab mix.  He can be very naughty.  I think it's totally ironic his name is Cole.  (think Christmas stocking)  We didn't even name him.  This little guy likes to nab our stuff and take it through the doggy door on the porch and out into our backyard.  What's funny is even when I think I've lowered the darn doggy door low enough so that he can get through but not he AND one of our back porch pillows, he manages to do it anyway!  When we got these pillows last year, he chewed a hole in one, tore buttons off a few more, and dragged others into the backyard to try to bury.  Yep.  I caught him in the act one time.  Throw pillows at my house have sadly been off-limits on our main floor.  Sniff, sniff.

Until one day recently Hubby and I had a brilliant idea.  Brilliant because we thought it would look good, and, more importantly, be a way that sweet Cole could not get our pillows.

Here is one of the pillows before:

 We bought several of these last summer on clearance at Target for $5 each.  Our back porch has a  2 chairs and a matching loveseat that we got at World Market last summer.  (I will be posting soon on this favorite room/porch of ours!)  We like the patriotic theme--but not a in-your-face flags everywhere way.  So I did three things with these pillows so that they would be Cole-proof and hopefully look good:

1.  I took off all of the buttons.  They were extra tempting for Cole.
2.  I glued a piece of red ribbon across the center of the pillow to give it more color and to go with our theme we have going on the porch.
3.  I tacked the ribbon to the sides at the seams and left extra length on each side so that we could TIE it to the back of the chairs.  YES, did you hear that Cole?  They are tied.  Ha.

So here is what our pillows look like now:

And the back:

We did something slightly different with the pillows on the loveseat.  Cross your fingers our little fella leaves them alone.   I can't wait to show you the whole porch in a future post!

Linking this project up to the following parties:

The Shabby Nest-Frugal Fridays
French Country Cottage- Feathered Nest Fridays
Chic on a Shoe String Budget-Flaunt it Friday
Simply Sweet Home- Friday Favorites
Featuring Your Sassy Sites
Nap Time Crafters- Friday Favs Party