Easy Fairy costume {tutu dress tutorial}

Are you ready for Halloween? I am a last minute costume Mom. When my older kids were tiny I would spend forever on costumes and start weeks in advance. Now my kids dig through the costume box the day before and I only make the little one a costume since the costume box is lacking in girl stuff.

E decided to be a fairy this year. Mostly because she really wanted the wings. The costume was way easy and I used leftover craft supplies that I already had in my craft stash.  Tutu dresses are so easy to make and turn out SUPER pouffy which I think is fabulous.


I started out with about 100 yards of 6 inch tulle on rolls.  I bought it at http://papermart.com a few years ago.  The yellow roll had about 60 yards left on it and the pink was maybe 20 and the orange around 40.  Your tulle amount is going to depend on how long you make your dress and how pouffy you want it.  E is 3 and her dress is 24 inches long.  You are also going to want a little strip of elastic, a piece of ribbon for the neck tie and whatever embellishments you want to decorate your dress.


Measure around the child's chest where you want the top of the tutu dress and cut your elastic about an inch smaller than that. Then sew ends of elastic together so you have an elastic circle.


Cut your tulle the fast way by wrapping it around something so you just have to cut once.  I used my 24 inch long quilting ruler.


Put your elastic around something so it's easier to attach the tulle.  I used a binder.  I like to double my tulle for maximum puffiness.  So take two of the strips and fold them in half. Push them under the elastic.


Take the bottom ends and feed them over the elastic and through the little loop of tulle.


Pull down gently.


Gently tighten by pulling down and slide that loop over by the rest so they are smushed together. Repeat with the rest of the tulle.


Once you are happy with the amount of tulle on your elastic it's time to attach the ribbon for the neck tie/haltar.  I cut a strip of ribbon about 3 feet long and just threaded it between two pieces of tulle.


Then tied it into a knot.  Then when the dress is on your child you just put the ribbon over their shoulders and tie it to the elastic in the back.  Or you could do a little halter and tie it behind their neck.  The flowers on the front of the dress were super easy.  They are just silk flowers from the craft store.


Cut the stems off and pull off the little green plastic thing that is usually on the back of silk flowers.


Snip the rest of the stem off right at the flower.  Make sure to leave just a bit of the green and put a little dab of hot glue right there to hold the remaining stem to the back of the flower.


Then grab a alligator clip.  I buy these at Sally's Beauty supply.  They come in packs of 100 for around $5.  Put a line on hot glue along the top.


Attach it to the back of the flower.  Now you can attach to the flower to the front of the tutu dress and use for hair bows.


Ta-da!  A fairy!  The wings were from Target and the wand is just one of those little glow sticks from Walmart.


Love how pouffy it turned out.


Happy Halloween!
Read more »

Farmhouse desk {how to age wood}

I've been working on my teenage sons bedroom which has been pretty challenging.  Girl bedrooms are easy-boys are SUPER hard.  You can find 8000 inspiration pictures for girl rooms and like 10 for boys rooms. Why is that?  We are going for an outdoor/antique look.

I found a super cool old trunk at Goodwill for $20 and used that for the jumping off point.  If you have super old trunk you can't have a super new desk.  I've seen tons of cool pallet furniture but I didn't really want to pick apart a bunch of pallets and we already had a pile of pine scraps in the garage from other projects.

The desk is an Ana-White farmhouse table plan modified to make it smaller.  Love the desk.  Don't love how shiny and new that wood looks.


Read more »

Henrietta Chair {Annie Sloan chalk paint}

I found this great chair at Goodwill for $10.  I've been looking for the perfect chair for my entryway and loved the legs on this one.

The before was not too bad but I knew I wanted to paint it since I already have a couple different wood stained tables in that area.

I painted two coats of Annie Sloan chalk paint in Henrietta and then finished up with the clear wax.  I wasn't sure I liked chalk paint when I first tried it on E's bookshelf  a few weeks ago.  I loved the look of the finish but it is just so different than latex paint.  The brush strokes are more visible with it and the waxing is more work than the actual painting.  It is getting easier to work with as I get used to it.  The seat is recovered in some Anna Maria Horner Home Decor-the line is called Drawing room.  The purple in the fabric matches the paint color perfectly!


Read more »

Pallet Coat Rack {glass door knob repurpose}

I've been working on a couple pallet projects so I had a big pile of pallet wood scrap in the garage. I found a vintage glass door knob at a little estate shop a few days ago and thought it would be perfect to hang coats. Easiest project ever. I grabbed a piece of wood out of the pile and sanded it a little. Didn't even cut it to make it even. The three glass hooks are new from Home Depot and I just used a bolt to attach the door knobs.


Read more »

Fall Coasters

I thought I'd show you how to make some easy Fall coasters.  They are super fun to have in your own house and great little gifts for friends or a hostess gift!

IMG_4197

Read more »
Powered by Blogger.
Back to Top