Hairbow Blowout

We go through a remarkable number of hairbows.  Piper doesn’t like to wear them, but she will typically keep one in her backpocket.  Rosemary must have one at all times and even sleeps in a hairbow.  Penelope enjoys wearing hairbows, but doesn’t leave them in as well as she should (but then again, she’s only 19 months).  Somehow, these hairbows disappear at a rapid rate.  I have no idea where they go, but around our house things had gotten serious because I could only find one pink hairbow, and that is just not enough for three girls, especially when you live in the South!

The problem with hairbows is that you can’t just go into Target and buy a big pack of them.  I have purchased hairbows from consignment sales, from Etsy, from other children’s sales, from retailers occasionally to match outfits purchased, etc.  These are expensive.  And even if you can manage to find them at a super-cheap price of $3 each, it’s still really expensive to buy enough for our three girls. . . .

So, a couple of weeks ago I googled “How to Make a Hairbow.”  Wow.  There are some amazing tutorials out there!!  I decided to line the alligator clips using this tutorial (but not add the no-slip grip), then I decided to attempt the pinwheel bow following this tutorial.  I found a seller on Amazon to purchase a box of 80 alligator clips, and another that sells some high quality yet nicely priced grosgrain ribbon (I decided on light pink, dark pink, chocolate brown, and a lighter green), and declared last weekend Hairbow Making Weekend 2012. 

It took about 8 hours over the weekend – but I ended up with 48 new bows.

All in all, it wasn’t too bad. I’m recovering from several hot glue gun burns and my fingers were incredibly sore for days from dealing with the wire and ribbon and using the lighter over and over again to seal the edges of the ribbon. They don’t really look like the examples, but I’m very pleased with how they turned out.

The best part is that they cost less than $0.75 each and I have alligator clips and ribbon left over to make even more hairbows.  Now that I know how to do this (not that I EVER intend to make 48 bows in one weekend again), I’ve realized that I can make hairbows with Halloween colors, and Christmas colors, and to match other outfits, etc.  The possibilities are endless!  I definitely don’t plan on making more hairbows any time soon, but at least I know how to do it now.

The best part is that the girls love their new hairbows!