Cut two 7” wide by a minimum of 54″ inch long strips or as long as the full width of your fabric will allow. The longer the strips, the larger your knotted pillow will be.
Form a sleeve of fabric by folding each strip in half. Make sure that the long way with the right sides are facing one another.
Pin both layers together.
Sew the length of the fabric at 3/8” seam allowance using a zigzag or knit stitch.
Sew along one of the short sides as well to close up the sleeve at one end. It’s important to use a zig-zag stitch so that the stitches stretch along with the fabric when stuffing the sleeves.
Feed the fabric sleeve into one end of the cardboard tube.
Pull it out the other end.
Fold it back onto the cardboard tube turning the fabric sleeve right side out.
Shirr the fabric sleeve completely onto one end of the cardboard tube.
From the other end of the cardboard tube, stuff in small pieces of fill.
Push it all the way to the far end of the tube using a ruler or wood dowel until it reaches the fabric sleeve. Try to keep the density of fill uniform throughout the fabric sleeve as you stuff.
Once the entire sleeve is stuffed, either tie off with a knot or sew up the open end of the sleeve with your sewing machine. Don’t worry, both ends will be hidden once the knot is tied!
Starting with just one fabric sleeve, tie the knot as illustrated below.
Once the first sleeve is tied, “trace” the knot that you just tied with the 2ndsleeve. To do so, tuck it under and over as needed to make the two sleeves run parallel to one another.
After the 2nd sleeve is in, adjust the sleeves so they form a tight knot.
Tuck the 4 loose ends back into the pillow so they’re concealed.