Tutorial - Custom Party Hats

I always have trouble with the party hat dilemma.  No one really WANTS to wear a party hat, but.... if you put them out and the 4 year old birthday boy starts handing them to people, they will put them on.  But they won't want to, so.... do you do the party hat thing or not? 

I did.  

But I didn't want to go the store bought party hat route.  I originally thought that I would try to find plain blue party hats, buy some white circle labels (ie. tag sale labels) and make polka dot hats.  Well... I couldn't find plain blue hats in any of the stores that I went to and as a cheapskate I HATE paying shipping fees for purchasing things online (I wait until I can find a "Free Shipping" code most of the time).

So... I bought these at the dollar store.

A little less than appealing, but I wasn't too concerned with the design on them because I knew that I would change them.  And even though it was a little more work that I originally planned.  I'm pretty pleased with the end results.

Here's after step 1:

And here's the final end product (although some of the pom poms got a bit smushed by this point when I took the photos- after the party):

It was a little more work -- but really-- NONE of it was hard.   I didn't take photos of the process -- but I promise you it was really easy.  

I took one of the store bought hats apart-- traced the outline of the deconstructed hat on scrapbook paper-- put the store bought hat back together-- used my trusty glue stick (yes- I'm pretty much a 1st grader) and glued the paper to the hat.

As seen in this post, I used the larger 4s that I cut out at work and just glued those to the front sides.  I didn't do this right away though-- hence some photos with the 4s and some without-- I took photos at two separate times.

For the pom poms, I took a piece of tissue paper-- approx. 4 inches in length -- accordion folded it lengthwise at about a 1/2 inch width a few times and then cut tiny slits in one side of it a little more than half way through the width.  Then I rolled the strip into a "tube" stuck it in the top of the hat, taped it on the inside a bit and fluffed.  

FYI:  In hind-sight, I probably would've done the pom pom part BEFORE putting the deconstructed hats back together and before gluing the paper on, but... it worked my way too-- just would've been a little easier the other way.

pom pom without 4s:

pom poms with 4s:

I tried the hats on my huge head and the elastic wasn't staying all that well.  Since it was going to be mostly adults in attendance (family) I knew I'd have to make them a little sturdier and I didn't want to go the "cute ribbon" route-- that was one way to ENSURE no adults would put on a party hat-- so a little scotch tape on the inside of the hat and the elastic stayed in place (for a little while anyway).

Again hats without 4s:

Hats with 4s:

and one final without:

Now for the whole progression again.

One more time.  Before:

After:

  

and After After:

  

And how do you store cute party hats with pom poms that you made a week and a half before the party  so that they they don't get smushed or crushed (remember my smushed pom pom pictures are from AFTER the party)?  

not to toot my own horn, but I'm kind of a GENIOUS!