Guinea Pig Hammocks

I replaced the hidey house in Bertie and Pinni's cage with a hammock last year, in part to keep Bertie out of the hay rack.  The girls regarded the hammock with suspicion for a few weeks before setting foot in it, but now, it's hard to keep them out of it.  Willow, of course, is an old pro with hammocks and has been sacking out in them for years.  So with two cages to furnish, I don't always have enough clean hammocks for every pig to use.  Time to make some more!

I have yards of fleece on hand at the moment, so I decided to make these with fleece on both sides so that they're reversible.  The hammocks I've made in the past have cotton fabric on one side and fleece on the other.

Guinea pig hammocks are really easy to make.  It requires two square pieces of fabric (between 13 to 15", depending on how big you want the hammock), four lengths of cord, each 5" long (8" long cord if you choose to have a smaller hammock) and four hooks (either metal or plastic) to attach the hammock to the wires on the cage.  I usually use 1/4" cord for the corners.  For this set, I used leftover boot laces (I knew they'd come in handy!).

Place the two squares right-sides together.  In each corner, between the layers, put a piece of cord folded in half with one hook threaded through the cord.  Make sure the ends of the cord are sticking just a bit beyond the edges of the material.  Pin and sew the square with a 1/4" seam, leaving a couple of inches open on one side in order to turn the hammock right-side out.  Turn out the hammock and slip-stitch the opening (or you could tuck in the raw edges and top-stitch the hammock 1/8" from the edge).

I top-stitched the across the corners where the cord  is, to make sure the cords wouldn't pull out, but that's an optional step.  Because these hammocks were all fleece, I added a layer of flannel in the middle and added another line of stitching about 1.5" from the edge to help stabilize it all.  I don't bother with the extra stitching if I use a combo of fleece and cotton fabric.

They're all ready to go!  I'm sure my girls will be thrilled to try them out.

We love our hammocks!