Make an Alice-style bow headband

My brother's girlfriend picked out this bag for me a couple months ago and when I was wondering what to be for Halloween it decided my costume.

I don't "go out" on Halloween but I do hang out with a friend and we give candy to the kids that come to her house so we like to dress up for them. And since I'm going to be Alice this year and I don't want to spend money on a costume I had to come up with something I could make with what I had.
I have to recant that a tiny bit because I did buy some Manectric eyeshadow from Shiro Cosmetics. It's beautiful!

I found an old headband and some sheets of black eco-felt.


Measuring how wide I wanted the bow to be, I cut a strip. Sometimes I use one of those rolling cutters (which for some reason I can't think of the name of...oh yeah I haven't had my coffee yet!) but they tend to stretch the felt and I end up with a weird angle on one end.


I glued my ends together with felt glue and held them closed with clothespin/bag clip things.


So that it will look like one continuous piece.


When it's dry, pinch the center to get your bow shape.


Then dab in some more glue and...


...clip it to hold while it dries.


And it would seem some of my photos went missing. Drat. Lemme 'splain. I cut a second strip of felt - slighter less wide than the first - to be the "tails" to my bow. I v'd the ends and pinched and glued it in the middle as well.


Because I've never made anything like this before and had NO clue what I was doing I'm going to let you learn from my mistakes. :)

In the photo you see I've got two pieces, one bow and one tail. My bow already has the center strip glued around the middle and my tail has a bulky center of it's own to contend with. Let me suggest that you hold off on the center strip on the bow until the very end.

Also let me suggest you cut your tail piece into two pieces, tapered at the center end, so you can just glue them under the bow (you won't even see the ends) and you don't end up with that bulk. Also this way your center strip can be glued around the whole headband and help secure it.

As it were, I glued my bow against the flat side of my pinched tail and then glued the tails straight against the back of the bow. Sounds complicated and I completely forgot - in my frustration - to photograph the process.

I did, however, get it all worked out in the end.




I hope you have an easier time of it. :)

UPDATED: Click here to see it in action.