Our guest bedroom comforter looked great – until my sloppy cousin, Alfred stayed over and left a felt pen sitting on it with the cap off. A giant black ink blot on a white comforter was a problem. But I discovered an easy way to make a designer-look duvet cover using a couple of sheets from a discount store.

A duvet is like a giant pillow case for your comforter. This one is made from an inexpensive, off-the-shelf sheet set. The duvet covers up the stained comforter, which was perfectly good otherwise, so I didn't have to buy a new one. Not only does the bed look great, but it's a lot easier to launder a duvet cover than to try to stuff a whole comforter in the washing machine.

Sewing Tools You Need:

• Sewing machine (We recommend the Janome DC2010)
• Straight stitch foot
• Scissors
• Pins

Fabric and Other Supplies:

• 2 Queen size flat sheets 
  Note: Be sure the sheets you select are larger than your comforter. We found that Queen Size sheets are large enough to make a duvet cover for a Queen Size comforter.
• 8 yds. coordinating ribbon (more if ribbons will be tied in a bow)
• Bobbin thread to match

Construction:

1. Measure your comforter. Add 1" to side dimension and ½" to length. This will give you a ½" seam on three sides.
2. Cut first sheet to to this size.
3. Cut second sheet to same width but add the length of the sheet's finished large hem. (The large finished hem on our second sheet was 4" so we cut the second sheet to be 4" longer than the first sheet.)
4. Cut ribbon into ten 8" pieces.
5. On longer sheet, pin ribbon pieces across the underside of the finished edge, spacing them evenly.
6. Turn each ribbon under ¼" and pin ¾" to fabric.
7. Sew to underside of the edge using a straight stitch with a 2.6 length. Make a square box of stitches to catch all of ribbon under edge.
8. Place ribbon lengthwise along same finished edge, pinning 1" from edge.
9. Sew down close to each edge of ribbon using a 3.0 stitch.
10. Insert comforter and tie ribbons to keep in place.

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