Ironman Pillow

A pillow for a friend doing Ironman this weekend

     A friend that I train with is doing Ironman Wisconsin in Madison this Sunday.  It is her first Ironman competition.  In case you don't know what this is, it consists of a 2.4 mile swim followed by a 114 mile bike and then a 26.2 mile run.  A long day and lots of training.

Stitching the front

     Most people I know, decide about a year out that they are going to do this race.  Once the holidays are over in December, training starts in earnest.  It is a long journey and setbacks occur.  I felt my friend could use a little encouragement for those bad days.

Lining marked

     I saw this great quote at Urban Threads, and felt it would be the perfect pick-me-up.  I had volunteered last year at this race and had a T-shirt from doing so.  I used this for her pillow.

Back cut, you can see the marks from using the template

     First I cut apart the shirt and applied stabilizer to the back.  I use Pellon's ShirTailor.  I then embroidered the saying on one piece and her name and the year on the other.  After doing the embroidery I used my pillow template from Rowley to cut lining and the shirt pieces to size.  I added just a regular dress zipper in the bottom.

Pillow back

     I'm hoping it helped to keep her going.  The best of luck to Susan and all my other friends from The Fitness Pursuit that are racing this weekend.