Saturday, April 20, 2013

Flower Power

Headbands
So I have a niece with a hair loss problem, and her birthday is coming up.  I was wondering what to get for her birthday, and I had an idea.  The headbands with the big flowers have been really helpful for camouflaging her thin spot, but they are not cheap.  So I thought that I could surely make some that would work better than the plastic ones that they sell. 

Step 1
 So I got a pack of elastic headbands,and I pulled out all of my silk flowers to use for embellishing. 

Step 1 - Cut 2 round pieces of felt and adhere them on either side of the headband.  This will allow the felt to be moved along the headband.the headband.  Personally I used hot glue. 


Step 2
Step 2 - Take apart your chosen flower.  You need to get it down to just the individual parts.  This is so that you can glue each layer individually to make it stronger and make sure that it will hold up. 


Step 3
Step 3 - Glue the leaves if there are any to the center of your felt round.  This will make your flower look more realistic.


Step 4
Step 5
Step 4 - Begin to glue the petals to the center of the leaves or felt round.  You start with the largest petal round.  You discard the plastic from the bottom of your silk flower.  If added this makes the flower unstable and if you don't glue individual petals the center will separate with use and the flower will fall apart. 


Step 6
Step 5 - Glue second round of petals.  Let each layer cool before adding the next layer.
Step 7
Step 8
Step 6 - You should be starting to get to the smaller bunches of petals by this point.  Continue to glue, but be sure that you are still getting the petals centered with the ones before.

Step 9
Step 7 - At this point you should be adding the last of your petal groups.  Continue until you have used all of your petal groups.

Step 8 - If there is a two piece center to your flower you need to glue the first piece to your petals.  And yes this does need to be done separately.

Step 9 - Trim your center down almost to the bottom of the post that goes through the flower.  You want to leave just a scissor blade length of the post on the center.

Step 10 - This step you do want to do while step 8 is still warm.  This piece needs to be placed into a pool of hot glue.  This will help to ensure the longest possible use of this flower.




Now you have a beautiful flower on a headband for the special little girl in your life.  Now you can make an assortment.  I even made one with gladiola flowers.  Since gladiolas are long spikes of flowers I glued them to a strip of felt also glued around the sides of the headband.  It turned out really nicely rounded, perfect to fit around a little girls head.


Update: her expression upon opening her gift



5 comments:

  1. What a sweet aunt you are to think of your niece this way! You're right... hair loss at any age is difficult to deal with and especially being so young. She will look so beautiful wearing one of your headbands and it will give her such a boost of confidence! Job well done!

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  2. Oh that's a delightful idea!! Hi Lois, and thank you so much for joining my party this week!! I'm excited to have you join me, and share your pretty headband projects! The whole tutorial is perfect and very well done. I know your niece will be a happy girl sporting such beautiful bands to school!! Pretty pretty!!
    Blessings,
    Doni

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  3. Brilliant! What a fantastic idea and I know that your niece loved the gifts.

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  4. What a wonderful aunt you are! They're beautiful...and so it your niece. Thanks for sharing on the HomeAcre Hop. Come back and see us this week: http://everythinghomewithcarol.com/self-sufficient-homeacre-hop-2/

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  5. Fabulous tutorial and great to "meet" you on Craft schooling Sunday!

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