Fall is the season when I crave everything cozy. My plush duvet slippers feel cozy. My yoga pants feel cozy. My fireplace feels cozy. Everything feels like it should invite warmth and comfort — except my family room. After the notorious “dog barf episode” that involved our white slipcovered sofa, the room lost its inviting warmth.
In frustration I threw away two of the three seat cushions, and the bare shell of the sofa sat in the family room, naked and unusable. Without seat cushions it wasn’t comfortable at all, and the whole space felt messy and incomplete.
That was not the cozy fall scene I had imagined.
I cleaned the sofa thoroughly so there was no lingering smell — score — but it still lacked cushions. When I learned my new replacement sofa wasn’t arriving until after the holidays, I decided I couldn’t spend the entire winter with an uncozy, disheveled family room. I had two choices: live without a sofa (not cozy) or get creative and make the old Pottery Barn sofa work for a few months.
Years earlier, when the back cushions started to look flat and saggy, I had tried stuffing bed pillows inside the zippered slipcovers. It wasn’t perfect, but it made the cushions firmer and much more comfortable — a practical “good enough for now” fix.
With a determined “I can make this work” attitude, I had my husband fetch a gray slipcover I bought years ago at IKEA, and I dug through the garage for temporary seat cushions. I found two outdoor chair cushions that would do the job well enough (though their shape didn’t match the slipcovers perfectly).
With only one original cushion still usable, and the rest filled by bed pillows and outdoor cushions inside a somewhat ill-fitting IKEA cover, the sofa doesn’t look like a high-end piece. But that’s fine — we’re not trying to be fancy. The soft gray slipcover feels cozy for fall, and the temporary setup made the sofa functional again. I was glad to have a place for guests to sit during a baby shower I hosted, and even happier to curl up on it while waiting for the new sofa to arrive.
And Jack & Lily are happy to have their sofa back, too — which, depending on how you look at it, might not be the best news for the upholstery, but it certainly makes the house feel lived-in and loved.
Cozy imperfections — that’s what matters most.
Let the fall coziness continue. Amen?
PS. For those who asked, here’s a link to my tufted ottoman mentioned earlier.
Related Posts:
Loving Fall Day 1: Getting in the Rhythm, and Day 2: Quiet
The Truth About White Slipcovers: Part 1, and Part 2 (Pet Edition)
Creating a Cozy Corner for Fall
How to Decorate: The Slow Process to a Style You’ll Love