Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Pink Satin Flower Headband

Yesterday I produced something so cute I can't stop looking at it and smiling. I made a yummy little headband for my tiny niece. I made a satin flower headband, in princessly pink of course. (What? I have just as much right to make up adjectives as the next person, y'all!) I found the most gorgeous pale pink super-soft elastic with a decorative twist running down the center while browsing at the store for ribbons. I don't know what it's actually intended to be used for, but it was calling my name and demanding to encircle a precious soft little baby head, so home it went. Then I kept it lying around for a while because I just couldn't decide what would be special enough to top something so pretty. Yesterday I finally got down to it and just did it.
 I used this tutorial as the basic idea for how to construct the flowers. You cut out circles, uneven is fine, and then you use an open flame to melt the edges so they stiffen and start to curl. It seems most people use a lighter as their heat source, but I don't keep lighters around the house and always use a tealight for such purposes. It's also handy when using grosgrain ribbon for anything, to seal the cut edges so they don't fray. Now I want to point out something that wasn't clear to me from the tutorial. If you hold the circle so the outer rim is nearest to the flame, the edge will harden and maybe shrink if held long enough, but it won't really curl up into the bowl shape you are aiming for. Good for sealing edges of things you want to keep flat so they don't fray. If you want the edges to curl up, you need to hold it so that the part of the circle that is on the bottom and on the edge is nearest the flame. So figure out which side of your satin, if it's different on both sides (mine had a more shiny side), you want to have showing at the top of your flower, and hold the bottom of the fabric so it faces the heat source. I like to make use of the side of the flame as opposed to the top, because I find it easier to avoid burning myself, so I'll hold my fabric by the side of the flame, not above it. You want to have the outer edge of the BOTTOM part of the circle turned to face the flame, not the actual outer edge of the circle. So you are melting a ring shaped area on the outer edge of the bottom of your satin circle. Make sense?
 I changed it up in a few ways. I used a soft pink satin ribbon, very wide, because I didn't have any satin fabric. I used fewer layers than the picture shows, and I burnt them for a short enough amount of time so that they they didn't get quite as curled up as on the photos in the tutorial. I felt this gave it a softer, daintier look, since it's for such a tiny princess. In the center, I glued on one of the pearls I bought on my trip to Michael's. I was going to use a large one, but when I tried it out, I felt the smaller one looked better. My kids agreed, so that's the one that went on. I also didn't bother with the leaves. I wanted more of a clean, minimalist look for this. I don't know why. But I'm glad it worked out.
I cut a piece of the pretty pink elastic 3/4 inch larger than the baby's head measurement. This turned out to be 15 inches, which happens to be a typical size for most newborn headbands, as I discovered from snooping about online a bit. I sealed the cut edges by melting with my trusty tealight. Then I sewed them together with a 1/4 inch overlap. I'm hoping I made it large enough to still fit her for a little while yet as she grows. I think it will, because the elastic is so soft that it's pretty stretchy without being constricting when stretched. Come to think of it, it might be just a tiny bit loose on her for now. Oh well, if it is she'll grow into it. So I hot-glued the flower right on top of the seam, then glued a felt circle under the elastic and to the underside of the flower to sandwich the elastic between the circle and the flower. This way, it lays nice and soft and smooth against her little noggin, with no bumps or rough areas to irritate her, and none of the glue or stitching shows. Maybe one of these days if I can overcome my aversion to uploading photos I'll post a picture, because I'm just so thrilled with the way it turned out.

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