Hooded Bath Towels

First off, for this project, I prefer to buy my towels at Wal-mart because they have a brand called Mainstays True Colors which are cheap and come in a variety of colors. But most importantly to me, they lack the ribbing that is found on most towels. I think the finished product looks better without a big stripe of ribbing going around the hood and down the sides. My opinion. The bath towels are $4, the hand towels are $3.50, and the washcloths are $2.50.

I have two versions of hooded bath towels to post. One is a very simple and easy version, and the other is even easier. Let's start with the even easier one.

First Version:

You'll need a bath towel and a washcloth of the same color. Fold the bath towel in half, right sides together, so you can find the center. Then place a corner of the washcloth at the center point and pin the side down onto the bath towel (right sides together if there are "sides"). Do both sides until it looks like this:
Now sew down the whole line, making sure that your seam allowance is as big as the binding on the side of the towel and washcloth. And you're done!
Second Version:

You will need a bath towel and a hand towel of the same color. You can follow this great tutorial at Skip To My Lou for this version.

There are a few things that I would adjust. When I made mine, I did not fold over the finished edge as shown in the second picture on Skip To My Lou. Also, depending on how tall you want the hood to be, you don't have to trim the hand towel to 10.5 inches. Leaving some length will give you a taller hood. This towel pictured was trimmed to 10.5 inches, and I probably would have left some length on it.

I added some large rickrack to the hood, and also down the sides. You can also add ribbon or embroider a monogram or name onto the towel.
This makes a fun, personal, cheap and easy gift! Give it a try!

Birthday or Dress-Up Crown

I made this crown for my daughter's birthday party. There are lots of cute ideas out there for crown color themes and design, but I went with the strawberry theme simply because I didn't have any other colors!

All I did was measure my daughter's head, and cut a crown shape out of white wool felt. This is not to be confused with the craft sheets of felt. Wool felt is purchased on the bolt at JoAnn's or any fabric store.

I made a stencil for the monogram using my word processor. I just picked a font I liked and printed out a stencil. I cut out the strawberries and butterflies and then sewed them onto the white piece by hand. If you are good with a machine, you can do it that way too, but I didn't trust myself at the time! I added the yellow french knots on the strawberries and the buttons on the butterflies.

When the white piece was done, I attached it to the red by sewing the rickrack on. I made a casing for a piece of elastic for the back, then attached it by zig zagging it onto both sides of the back, and I was done!

It was a very fun project and I highly recommend it! It was fun and fast and I am very happy with the result!