A Tu-Tutorial!

Mistress Monstress will be three in a couple of weeks, and so I am in the process of working on things for her birthday party. If you've been following my blog for a while, you know that I am big on inexpensive birthday parties. Buggy's birthday last winter and The Professor's Birthday (also last winter) were both done on the cheap, and the kids had just as much fun as they would have had if we had spent a mint on their party. With that in mind, I started today working on the favors for MM's two party guests!

Ages ago, I decided on a theme for her party, and although I'm not going to share the theme quite yet, these tutus are going to be part of the favor bags and will tie in nicely with what I am planning. These could almost be no-sew, but I did stitch the ends of the elastic together. Anyway, I started by measuring MM's waist and cutting elastic that size. I overlapped the ends and stitched them together firmly. (lots of backstitching to make sure that it holds together! I forgot to take a picture, but you will get the idea in a couple of pictures. For the tutu part, I bought three rolls of 6 inch tulle in emerald green at Hobby Lobby with 25 yards per roll. It retails for $2.99 a roll and they were half off so I spent $4.50 in tulle. Elastic is cheap, I used 3/4 inch and one small package was enough for two tutus. I think it was $.79. So we're at just over $5 for two of them if you're keeping track!

Next, I cut strips of tulle that were 20 inches long. Lots and lots of strips. (The finished length will end up being 10 inches, which is perfect for a 3 year old. If your child is older, you may want to make the strips longer.) I would highly suggest some music to make the time pass faster. Take each strip and fold it at the center.

With your elastic pinned to the ironing board, loop each over the elastic and pull the ends through tightly. The first couple were a pain, but then I got into a rhythm.

Push each strip close to the next one, and repeat the process. A lot.

Continue all the way around until you have a finished tutu! This took me around an hour or so, and was really very easy once I got into a rhythm.

Paired with a flower headband from the $1 spot at Target, you have your first clue as to the theme of her party. Care to take a guess?

Check back in the coming weeks to see more projects from her party and find out the answer to the "What's the theme of Mistress's party?"