One of my favourite things from Connor’s hungry caterpillar birthday celebration was the little matching party hats I made up for him and his brother, let me refresh your memory with a very bored looking birthday boy…

(Connor is 3 going on 13, he has already decided he is far too cool to have people sing “Happy Birthday” to him)

The hats are great if you’re fed up of buying party hats that rarely last the day or to add to a dress up box for roleplay – if my boys are to believed, it’s somebody’s birthday pretty much every day in our house, and it always requires party hats, pretend cake and scouring the toy box to find things to wrap in fabric and regift to each other. They only take about 20 minutes each to make up, less if you set up a bit of a production line and do each step in one hit, and they’re inexpensive to make so making enough for a small party of kids isn’t completely unattainable.

You Will Need

• Printed cotton
• Scrap of felt
• Ric-Rac (this multicoloured Ric-Rac was from Spotlight and I love it!)
• Elastic (I used clear swimming elastic as that’s what I had on hand)
• Fusible interfacing – the heaviest weight you can find
• Glue (a glue gun would work fine, I just had the E-600 nearby)
• The party hat pattern – downloadable here.

1. Trace the pattern onto your interfacing, cutting out an extra band along the edge of the hat to stabilise the edges – this stops the elastic distorting the shape. Cut the interfacing out about a cm away from the edge of the pattern, apart from the inside curve of the stabilising band which needs to be on the line.

2. Iron the party hat interfacing to your printed cotton – take care placing any images, remember that the centre of the shape will be the front of the hat, so take this into account when placing the fabric.

3. Line up the stabilising band and iron it straight on top, matching up the sides and bottom.

4. Sew a line close to the edge, but not on it – you can skip this if you’re only making them for a party, but as I knew my kids were going to be playing with them often I like to add this, just to re-inforce them even more and stop the interfacing becoming dettached over time. Cut out the party hat shape on the pattern line.

5. Mark the spots to attach the elastic and measure the length you need. My hats go around the back of the kids’ heads, and I needed 40cm – but, my kids have huge heads and swimming elastic doesn’t have a huge amount of stretch, so measure your intended head!

6. Taking care not the twist the elastic attach it to each side on the inside of the hat, back stitching a couple of times to secure.

7. Glue your ric-rac on, bending it around the curve. If the ric-rac is a bit girl for you, you could use bias binding sewn on instead. Make sure to only put glue on the top bumps, as the lower ones will sit below the line of the hat. Leave a cm excess on each side.

8. Cut a 10x15cm piece from your felt.

9. Cut a rectangle from the corner measuring 5x7cm.

10. Cut into strips, stopping a cm away from the end to create a fringe.

11. Fold the fringe onto itself, starting at the smaller end so that the longer parts are on the outside. Pin to the outside of your hat with the fringe facing inwards.

12. Stitch close to the edge, following the curve of the top of the hat.

13. Trim the excess felt away.

14. Fold your hat in half and pin. I also pin the topper to keep the fringe out of the way, and make sure your elastic is clear as well.

15. Stitch along the edge to join the sides of your hat, turn right side out, poke the topper out and you’re done!

Now go take lots of photos of your kids wearing ridiculous party hats that you can then pull out at their 21st or wedding.

They’re not just for birthdays either, use Christmas fabric for Christmas lunch – using tinsel instead of felt for the topper, or school theme fabric for a back to school party, how about making the most of the huge amount of Halloween fabric you can buy now?

Seriously, if anyone makes Halloween party hats you NEED to send me photos, that may be the cutest thing ever.