Back to School Tradition: DIY Special Event Pillowcase

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Today I want to share a fun back-to-school tradition that we’ve started in our household to try and excite my daughters for the beginning of the school year.  My daughters have love-hate relationship with back-to-school time (so do I!), so I’m trying to add a little something extra to help encourage more excitement.  Hence, this fun back-to-school pillowcase idea.

Our Back To School Tradition

After being home all summer, my daughter wasn’t super thrilled at first about the idea of going back to school. I mean, who doesn’t want to sleep in every day and have no regimented schedule?  However, she was definitely looking forward to hanging out with her friends more.  We don’t do a ton of play-dates over the summer because that’s just not my style to invite a bunch of kids I don’t know over to my house.  So, we really only see her few best friends whose mom’s I already know.

I wanted to start a fun back to school tradition, and this definitely made her more excited for school!  As an aside, my other back to school traditions at this point only include packing an extra special lunch with note and taking cute pictures.  (Or not so cute since she’s determined to smile-grimace in pictures these days!)

Sewing Holiday Pillowcases

I started this plan of making pillowcases earlier this year with her awesome Easter-themed pillowcase.   Then I followed up with a Fourth of July pillowcase.   I’m planning on making pillowcases for every major holiday.

As I’ve mentioned before, a few weeks before the holiday or event rolls around, I plan to put the appropriately-themed pillowcase on her pillow and let her sleep on it.  I’m hoping this will help increase her holiday excitement and also give her an understanding of holiday timing. For example, back-to-school happens after Fourth of July, and then Halloween comes soon after back-to-school.

Since school started school last week, in preparation for the big day, I made her a back to school pillowcase!  I’m a little late in posting the pictures, but better late than never, right?  Here’s her special pillowcase:

I like the fun school print.  It came from Hobby Lobby, and I lucked out at finding it on their $2/yard clearance, so sewing the pillowcase ended up being a lot cheaper than buying a back-to-school pillowcase.

As with all my other pillowcases, I used the measurements and instructions for this DIY pillowcase tutorial here.  Overall, I sewed the pillowcase in less than 15 minutes, which was great timing for this busy mom!

What do you think about the idea? Any other good back to school traditions you have?