a personalized pillow

My daughter has a friend that celebrated her birthday last week. I wanted to make her friend a pillow (I've had it in mind for months!) and even though I didn't feel like I had the time to make it, I whipped it up anyway. It's amazing how much one can get done with a little bit of focus and a deadline.

A lot of these cute scraps came from my friend Mary. (Thanks Mary!!!) My daughter had picked them out and squirreled them away as her favorites. I couldn't think of a better project to use them for! I used a regular sized bed pillow for the form and added an envelope backing (similar to this) so the pillow cover is washable. An absolute must!

With a name like Mandara, I knew that personalized items are hard to come by, so I wanted to be sure to include her name somewhere on the project. I used my rustic embroidery skills (heh) to add her name to one patch. I like that it's included in the mix, but that it's not necessarily the focal point. When I was stressing over the lack of perfection, my husband reminded me that the recipient is 9, and not to worry about it. It's always good to have a voice of reason!

I'm happy to say that Mandara loved it! She and my daughter had fun looking at all the different fabrics and finding cute things to squeal over. It was delightful! It felt pretty good to be able to cross something off my list, too.