guest post:: diy easter bunny headband

Hello Living the Swell Life readers my name is Rebekah and I blog over at a bit of sunshine. It is an honor to be here today! I have a fun little project just in time for the Easter weekend to share with you - An Easter Bunny Ruffle Headband for all those little girls in your life! There's a lot of steps but let me assure you it's super quick and easy. Are you ready? Ok lets get started: (click on the photos to enlarge)

For this project you will need:
1. 1/4 yard of fabric - I used a fat quarter and a some silk scraps, whatever you have on hand should do.
2. a plastic headband. I bough mine in the bridal section at my local JoAnnes for under a dollar.
3. fabric glue
4. scissors
5. clothes pins
6. a flower embellishment (the one Jessica posted earlier in the week would work perfectly!)
7. pipe cleaners
8. a sewing machine

1. Begin by measuring your headband you are going to cut a three inch strip of fabric at least two times the length of your headband. My headband was 15" long so I cut my strip 40" because I had that much length but ended up trimming it down. You just need enough length to make it ruffly.

2. Press your strip with a hot iron and fold it in half with right sides together. Sew it into a long tube and flip the tube right side out. This is the hardest part - it just takes a little patience!

3. Now iron your tube flat with the seam in the center.

4. Next you are going to sew a little track in your tube by sewing a straight stitch down each edge of the fabric. Use your foot to gage it, about a quarter inch should do just fine.

5. Your ready to slip the tube onto your headband, the fabric will ruffle up as you slide it on, use a clothes pin on one end to keep the fabric from slipping off and on the other end put a good dab of glue and fold the fabric over onto itself to secure. Secure each side with the glue and then clothes pins and let the ends dry.

6. At this point you are ready to add your flower embellishment. I chose a vintage millinery flower with a feather and a rhinestone button to take it over the top. You could really use anything here, a big bow, a rossette - the skies the limit! Glue it on with your favorite fabric glue - I chose to use a small circle of felt on the back but it is totally not necessary to do so.

7. Ok while the headband is drying grab two pipe cleaners and twist the ends together.

8. Shape the pipe cleaners into a bunny ear and twist again to close at the bottom. Leave yourself some "legs" to attach to the headband.

9. With some fabric scrap strips - either the same fabric you used for the ruffle or a coordinating one I chose some raw silk because I wanted them to be fancy. Glue the end of the strip down onto the pipe cleaner and then wrap the entire ear with the fabric including the extra legs.

10. Once your ears are dry you can attach them to the headband by simply wrapping the pipe cleaners around the band and tucking them under your flower embellishment. This way you can remove the ears if you want for use after the holiday!

My little girl will be wearing the ears to our annual Easter Egg Hunt but I will remove the ears for church - maybe :).

I hope you guys have fun making Easter Bunny ears for your sweetie pies. For a boy version you might consider skipping the ruffle steps and simple wrap the same scraps you use on the pipe cleaner ears around the headband.

Happy Easter - may it be full of much joy and life!
xo,
Rebekah