How to Make Waterbed Sheets

Do you have a water bed that you love?....All except for the outrageous prices they charge for a set of sheets for it? Do you hate paying top price for a set of roughly woven, scratchy sheets just because it's for a water bed?

If you can sew a few straight (or mostly straight) seams and cut cloth to size, you can make your own set of high thread count water bed sheets for a fraction of the prices to be found in stores. Here's how:

Steps

1
Determine the size of your mattress. Here are the common sizes found in the USA, but you can use this article to make waterbed sheets in any size.
- Twin Mattress --39" wide x 75" long
- Twin XL Mattress --39" wide x 80" long
- Full Mattress --54" wide x 75" long
- Full XL Mattress --54" wide x 80" long
- Queen Mattress --60" wide x 84" long
- Cal-King Mattress --72" wide x 84" long
- King Mattress --76" wide x 80" long
in the correct size for your water bed. Regular fitted sheets are the same size as "water bed" fitted sheets. The only difference is the "tuck under" flap at each corner.
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Waterbed sheets differ from regular bed sheets in two ways. 1- They have corner tabs (red corners) to help you "tuck in" the sheet and 2- The top sheet and bottom sheet are sewn together (green line) at the foot.
(also known as the "flat" sheet) across your water bed with the top edge aligned with the top edge of the bed.
so that only 4–6 inches (10.2–15.2 cm) are overlapping on that edge of the bed (right side in this picture).
Note that when you have two sides lined up nicely, the remaining sides (left side and bottom edge) will hang over by quite a bit, usually 18 inches (45.7 cm) or more.
you want on the left side and bottom. You can use tailor's chalk, pins, marker, whatever works for you.
and double check your markings before removing the sheet from the bed and cutting along the lines.
It will form your "tuck in" flaps later.
Smaller than that, and they will not be as effective at "tucking in" as they need to be. Larger than that is up to your discretion, but try not to make them any larger than you can realistically lift the mattress corner for "tuck in".
Don't worry about tucking it in. This is just for placement marking.
of the sheet/mattress with tailor's chalk, markers or pins (careful not to poke the mattress).
Pull any elastic taut while sewing to allow for stretch when sewn.
Again, pull any elastic straight and taut and sew with a zig zag stitch to allow for stretch later.
$How.com.vn English: Step 24 Enjoy using your nice, new, high quality sheets at a fraction of the retail cost!$
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How do you position and sew the tuck in flaps to the corner of the regular fitted sheet to make it tuck and hold to the waterbed mattress?
Tj Armstrong
Community Answer
The hemmed sections you saved from the overages you removed are attached, good sides facing each other, at each of the four corners indicated in the diagram. Stretch the elastic out completely as you go around the corners to add the flaps so they will work when the fitted sheet is stretched around the bladder of the water bed. Tucking these under further than just the fitted sheet keeps everything in place as well as the pre-made waterbed sheets, but gives you a broader selection of sheets at a fraction of the price and for not much work! I just add heavy white cotton to the corners of regular sheets without changing the hang over lengths.
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Tips

If you purchase the top and bottom sheets separately, you can buy the top sheet one bed size smaller and skip the cutting. (example: King size bottom sheet, Queen size top sheet) Just use other fabric scraps for your "tuck in" corner flaps. Bandannas would work fine too. The material will not be seen when "tucked in" anyway.
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Purchasing your "regular" sheets from a thrift store can save even more money.
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Warnings

Be very careful with pins around the waterbed. It is strongly not recommended to mark your cloth in this traditional way, but use chalk instead.
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Saving money can be addictive! The author's out of pocket cost on these was $16 USD. Purchasing new, poorer quality "water bed" sheets, at a retailer would have cost her over $120 USD.
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