(Haha, I love that title!)

So, I have a confession to make. For those of you who know me through my blog, this might come as a surprise because I rarely talk about it. Truth is, I’m sort of a ballet/dance nut. I took ballet lessons as a kid up until I was 10, and then quit because I wanted to concentrate on schoolwork (I was a strange kid). I’ve always sort of regretted letting go of ballet, so when I came to the States about seven years ago, I took the proverbial leap off the cliff and enrolled in adult ballet classes. It was one of those things that I had always wanted to do, and it turned out to be one of the most enriching periods in my life. I loved my classes and earned my toe shoes after two years of (very) hard work. I haven’t gone to classes for about a year now because of many (lame) reasons, but really hope to return to them soon-ish/next year. In the meantime, whenever there’s a chance to do something dance related, I kind of jump on it.

And so, when one of my nieces turned one, I couldn’t resist the urge to make her a tutu. I’m sharing how I made it because it’s a cute costume for little girls for Halloween  or equally fun to make for just about any occasion: a birthday, a costume for school or even for little flower girls at a wedding.

This was the fun, (almost) no-sew tutu that I made for my niece Thérèse.

Thérèse’s tutu was made in one afternoon with minimal materials:
(1) elastic, (2) ribbon, (3) tulle in contrasting colors (I used about 1 ½ yards of each, and I had plenty left over)

Making the tutu itself was easy peasy. I did this while watching some cheesy TV—that’s how much (or none, really!) concentration it takes.

Measure the child’s waist and subtract two inches. Join the ends and sew together. The one I made, however, is the Obsessive Crafter’s version: I attached some ribbon to both ends with a stitched “X” so that the waist is adjustable. Tie the ends together (if you’re following my crazy version).

Measure how long you’d want the tutu to be, double that length and cut strips of tutu accordingly. Therese’s tutu had 19-inch long strips, and were about 3 inches wide.

Take your elastic and loop the strips of tulle around it. Think of the classic bookmark loop, where you take the ends and work them over into a knot around the elastic, with the ends hanging down.

I alternated the colors for every five pieces of tulle, but you can pretty much combine the colors however way you want. If I had the chance, I’d probably add some pieces of colorful ribbon, or even artificial “vines” with flowers on them for a fairy-like flair.

Ta-daa! Pas-de-deux ready!

The tulle is very forgiving, by the way. You can smooth it out to make it sleeker, or scrunch it up to make it poofier.

Here’s Thérèse rockin’ her pink poof!

I hope you get the chance to make this for a little ballerina in your life. You’ll find that it really IS as easy as un, deux, trois!