Dawn asked me to make a portrait doll of her mum to give as a gift to her dad on Father’s Day 2020. Pauline had been a very good friend of ours for many, many years. Last year, in May, she found out she had cancer. She spent some time in the hospital before going into The Prince and Princess of Wales Hospice where she lived her last few months, till August 2019. Pauline had a very big personality, and a huge heart, so was a big loss to all her family and friends. Of course I wanted to do this for Dawn. I started ‘the mum doll’, as it became known, the very next day. We discussed which photo we would use for inspiration and in the end chose a lovely picture of Pauline at her 40th anniversary dinner. It was a time when Dawn, us and all her family and friends were there so would be memorable to all of us. I used the pattern for the body of the doll from Louise Crowther’s lovely book The Knitted Doll and designed the head myself. It worked out perfectly in the end, loved by all.