Easter Bonnet

There is not much sewing going on right now but I wanted to show you something that is hanging on the wall in my sewing room.



Each year at my daughter's school they have a Hat Parade for the Kindergartners and the First Graders around Easter time.



The first year my daughter participated I asked her what kind of hat she wanted me to make.



She told me that the her hat had to be pink and she wanted it to have lights on it! At five she had already figured out that her mom can make almost anything.

I started with a straw hat from Michael's. I cut a circle of fabric that was hand gathered on the edges to cover the crown of the hat.

For the brim, I measured the width of the brim and added about an inch. Using pink fabric from my stash, I cut two pieces of fabric the width of the fabric and seamed them together.

I ran the seamed strip of fabric through my pleater. I fanned the fabric out like I would when blocking a Bishop dress. After the pleats were distributed evenly, I used dots of white craft glue to hold it in place temporarily.

With a long needle and quilting thread I basted the fabric on the crown with the pleated fabric together.



I then lined the inside of the hat. The inside crown is another circle that has been gathered on the edges. The inside brim is a large donut shape piece of fabric. I laid the hat on the fabric and traced the outer edge. Again the brim was basted to the crown and the outer edges were held in place with dots of craft glue.




The Bias edge is purchased double fold quilt binding. I put a jeans needle in my sewing machine and threaded the machine with quilting thread. With a Zig Zag stitch, the binding was stitched through the straw hat.





Because this hat was going on a 5 year old and there was going to be several practices, the silk flowers were wrapped in floral tape and secured with a needle and thread to the hat. Ribbons were added to hid the raw edge between the crown and the brim.

Now the most important request----- the Hat had to have lights on it. I bought two battery powered mini lights from Micheal's. The battery packs were stitched to the sides of the hat. The lights were then woven in and out of the flowers. Ties were then added to the sides of the hat to help keep it on her head.

TA Da! A pink hat with Light! :-)