from Pinterest "pin" to bowling pin

Last month our family received a most precious invitation in the mail:

You remember Gavin, don't you? I wrote about him here in 2010, & here in 2011. He is such a fighter! It's been a blessing to follow his progress through his mama's blog and facebook.


What to make for the little guy, though? I started "shuffling" through my Pinterest boards and came across this pin

which caused me to do a Google search until I found this tute

Perfect for a young man's birthday! 


So... here's how I accomplished it:


I cut out fabric (3 layers) to cover a baseball. I embroidered "Gavin" on one side and 3 dots to represent bowling ball finger holes on the other. I hand stitched it around the ball; then trimmed & clipped it to be a little raggy along the seams (so the lil' man could get a good grip...)

I embroidered bunny faces

cut out 36 ear pieces

pinned 36 ear pieces

& stitched together twelve bunny ears...

The most difficult part of this project was stitching the neck area without catching those ears in the seam. It was a little tight! (I did try sewing one leaving the top of the head open then hand-stitching the ears -- but that was not much of a time saver...)


After sewing together the body and stuffing it almost full with Pollyfill, we added about 1/3 cup rice to weight the bottom of the pin. This was the second most tedious task! (Well, it was a toss-up between that & hand stitching the bottom without getting rice all over...)

My boys might, or might not have enjoyed a bowling game or two.

I decided Gavin would probably need a bag in which to store his bunny bowling set. I covered all the seams & boxed the bottom & added drawstring ribbons.

Those pins sure look cute in there, don't they?

We had a lovely time at the party!

Here's a glimpse of a pretty tired, just about over-stimulated, almost overwhelmed Gavin.