Call me cheesy, but I think activities at birthday parties (or any party for that matter) are a lot of fun! Anything that gets people involved and having a great time is a good thing.

I didn’t have a particular theme in mind when planning Ellie’s 2nd birthday party. All I knew is that I really wanted to create a tutu – actually a “two-two” – making station and have all her little friends make and take a tutu of their own creation. The play on words was too good to pass up (again, call me cheesy)!

First step was to make a tutu myself to see how much time (and skill) was required. I hoped for not a lot of either. Here are the steps I followed:

I sewed an elastic waistband using 1/2″ elastic and using this size guide (approximate):

18 months = 16”; 2T = 16.5”; 3T = 17”; 4T = 18”; 5T = 19”, 6T = 20”

I used 6″ spools of tulle and wrapped it around a strip of cardboard so that I could cut it quickly. The cardboard was twice as long as I wanted the length of the tutu to be. In my case it was 23″ long, creating a tutu that would be about 11″ long.

I slipped the elastic band over a small chair and started looping the tulle through, piece by piece. Once I had gone around one time, I went around again, filling in anywhere I could to make a full tutu. Ellie’s tutu took about 50 yards of tulle.

What I learned: Level of skill required was pretty low but time required was higher than I thought so I decided that I’d have to start each tutu for the girls.

I recruited my Mom and my sister to help in the days leading up to the party. We rolled and cut all the tulle and then my sweetheart of a Mom did a thin layer of tulle on all the little girls’ tutus.

I used the same guide to make waistbands for each little girl. Then I tagged it with their name. We had two lengths of tulle – 17″ long for the 2 older girls and 11″ long for the 2-3 year olds.

The activity was a hit! The little girls loved the idea of customizing their own tutu, and with the help of their moms (and MY dad, funny enough), they were made pretty quickly. Some of the older girls even used tulle as headpieces and jewelry – extra points for creativity!

Because there were little boys invited to the party as well, I extended the two-two making station to a two-two and bow-tie making station. I was originally going to have them make their own bow-ties but in the end, I just ordered some adorable handmade bowties from Etsy and the boys were totally fine with that.

I’m so happy it was a success. The moms seemed to enjoy doing the special activiy with their little ones. And I really can’t think of a better party favor than a tutu, am I right? 😉