Children's pillowcase

We're ready for bed....Join the sleep set....Sweet dreams love....See you in the morning....

is the message written around my pillowcase. One of my Grandma's (I had 4 in my hay day) bought this for me many many Christmas's ago. She was a champion of upmarket catalogue shopping and as a result we had varied, and mostly good gifts from her. The monogrammed theme lasted a few years (towels, note-lets, pens & pencils) but the pillowcase was my favourite.  Obviously as it came with me to the USA!  I confess to giving it a good sniff when I found it in the cupboard. Still smells of my childhood.

Anyway it prompted the thought to make a pillow case for my niece, Florence, who is moving into a big bed very soon. The design inspiration came from looking at this fab embroidered growth chart.  

The first thing I did was cut out blocks 3x3 inches & sew them together. Then pressed the seems towards the lighter coloured fabric.

Next step was to patch pieces to make the "F" & press the edges in. I'm sure there is a better way of doing this but the end result is satisfactory.

The strip of coloured blocks were sewn into the fabric approx 3/4 of the way in.  It took a lot of brain power to work out how best to do this (really!). In the end I opted for pinning the strip then cutting the front face of the pillow case and sewing each piece of the front fabric to the strip separately. Makes sense, right?!

Here's the finished article.  I hope it lasts as long as my pillow case has!