I think we’re all aware of my Pinterest addiction and this birthday party planning is no different. I’ve been scanning and have become rather obsessed with all the adorable tulle ballerina skirts. My friend Laura, back in the Fall, decided to actually take a stab at making Peanut an adorable orange tu-tu. I couldn’t believe how awesome it turned out! Laura told me how easy it was to make and even gave me some leftover tulle. I was intrigued, but still unsure.
As an alternative, I’ve been stalking Etsy for adorable tu-tu’s, but I just couldn’t bring myself up to pay $35 + shipping.
So, I went out to Jo-Ann Fabrics and bought an insane amount of tulle, some ribbon, an elastic, and went to work.
And you know what? It didn’t turn out too bad!
The total cost (I forgot all my coupons and didn’t really shop sales) was $26 and I still have plenty of ribbon and some elastic left over (in case I’m insane enough to try this again).
Making the skirt took a total of less than 2 hours – the longest time that I spent was on cutting the tulle into appropriate lengths. You can look up a step by step tutorials online, but here’s the quick and dirty:
- Measure and cut the elastic then sew the two ends together. This took about 2 minutes.
- Cut the tulle into the length you want (you may want to cut them a little longer, you’ll see why in a second). This took about 30 minutes.
- Tie the tulle around the elastic. I made 3 – 4 layers. This is another 30 minutes.
- Cut some ribbon and tie it on top. Maybe 2 minutes?
- Put the skirt on something that will let you see the whole thing and trim it. This took about 10 minutes.
- Admire your work. This is still going on.
I didn’t look up any tutorials before I did this – I just trusted Laura on the whole “it’s wicked easy” thing and winged it (shocker, I know). Here’s what I learned:
- Tulle is a pain in the south region.
- Peanut can only play by herself for about 5 minutes before she tries to rip apart all the tulle.
- I have the patience of a 1 year old. I got frustrated while cutting the tulle about 5 different times.
- Trimming the skirt after it is finished gives it that nice poofiness. Yes, that’s a word now.
- The hubs can’t refrain from wearing tu-tus on his head.
So was it worth it? In the end I probably saved about $10, but the sheer pride of knowing that I made it for my little nugget is worth it.
I bet if you bought this in bulk, on sale, or with a coupon, you would get a much better deal and could stand to save a lot more than I did.
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