Terrible Tesla's many dog beds

We got our first puppy, Tesla in September of 2011. Boy was she a cutie! Her little face could charm anyone. We were so excited to get her from this great shelter out in Portland Oregon called Family Dogs New Life. I think that they run a great program and take good care of the dogs. If you want more information go here. Anyways, back to Tesla. She was bright, active, and very playful.  She also treated us to many a destroyed pillow.

When we first got her she was small enough to fit on a standard pillow and pillowcase. So rather than buy an expensive bed for her to shred, we would just give her our old pillows and he guest room pillows. This was how we upgraded all the pillows in our house.













After a while though, she started to get too big for the pillows, so we switched to making her dog beds. The first dog bed that we made, we used fleece. The fleece was nice and soft but got dirty really fast. To make the bed, we cut out two matching circles, then cut "tabs" along the edge to tie them together. This is really similar to those no sew blankets. I overstuffed the bed so that it would stay nice and thick.


The problem with this bed, was that Tesla would stick her nose between the ties and pull out the fluff. Turns out that she really likes the eat the fluff. This would then of course lead to many an awkward potty time. We scrapped this bed pretty quickly. Besides, the fleece started to get dirty immediately. This bed cost us $8 for the fleece, and $10 for the fluff. We had leftover fleece that I made dog toys from too so that would take the cost down a little.

For her next bed, I don't have any great pictures, but we took upholstery fabric and  cut out two matching rectangles, and made a long strip of fabric about 5 inches wide. We sewed the strip of fabric to each rectangle to act as a side then sewed the ends closed. I stuffed it with the stuffing from the previous bed, and some more fluff I bought at Joann's. This bed cost $15 for the fabric, and about half a box of fluff for $10. This bed actually stayed cleaner looking longer. It also held up to Tesla's onslaught for several months, until one day I cam home to this nice little hole ripped in the bottom. I tried a quick repair with some iron-on tape, but she just nibbled it off in her spare time.

Cute Face, Big Trouble!

So onto bed number 500 it feels like. To make this bed we went and picked up some outdoor canvas to make the outside of her bed. This time, rather than make a fancy wall to the bed, or some kind of a cute look, we went for quick and dirty. I purchased 2 yard of fabric and folded it in half with the nice side on the inside. I sewed straight lines down the sides leaving a hole on one side to put stuffing in.

To give her as few opportunities to chew on her bed as possible, I rounded the corners of her bed. I just did it freehand. I would then cut off the corners so they would not bunch when it was flipped in side out. I flipped the fabric inside-out like you would a pillow and then stuffed it with all of the stuffing from the previous bed. So far its been holding up great. We spent about $10 on the fabric and just reused the fluff. The canvas also holds it colours a little better too.

Sad face because she is in her pen when it's not pen time. 

Totally waiting for a treat!

All in all it seems to work better to just make her beds rather than buy her new ones. The new ones can be so expensive, and as we are going through her puppy phase, she may still keep on ripping up her beds. So far though, this bed has lasted for 4 months, so we may be done. I am just glad to not have her eating the fluff!