DLTK's Holiday Crafts for Kids
Petal Skirt

Simple petal dress that you can sew or hot glue in an evening.  If you're hot gluing the pieces, it takes less than an hour.  The skirt basically ties on like an apron -- leggings look nice under it.

Don't go crazy purchasing expensive fabrics...  I've given guidelines as to what I bought (at Walmart) when I made the skirt but you can use whatever's cheapest.

Materials:

• length of wide ribbon that goes around the child's waist with left over for tying a bow.
• 1 meter (1 yard) of net-type fabric (tulle).
• optional:  1 meter of iridescent-type fabric.
• 2 meters (2 yards) of satiny-type fabric

Note:  ribbon and materials should all be complimentary colors.

Try your best to find fabrics that don't fray too badly.
 

Instructions:

• Measure a length of ribbon that goes around the child's waist with a foot or two left over (enough to tie a bow)
  • use pins or marker to mark on the ribbon where it would be knotted if it were tied around the child's waist (we don't want petals on the part of the ribbon we're going to use to tie a bow).
• Tape a couple of pieces of white paper together to make a large piece of paper and draw a petal shape on it.
  • The petal should go from the child's waist nearly to the knee (or even a bit below the knee).
  • The largest petal should be used for the satiny-type fabric (the least see-through).
  • Design a shorter petal for the second type of fabric.
  • And an even shorter petal for the third type of fabric (if you have one)

• Cut out the petal templates you just drew.
• Fold your fabric over and over so it's as small as possible, but the template piece fits on it.
• Pin your template to the fabric and cut out your petals.
• Repeat with the other petal sizes and fabric types.
• Use hot glue or a needle and thread to stitch the petals onto the length of ribbon -- don't put any petals on the parts of ribbon you'll be using to tie into a bow.
  • When attaching your petals, just keep layering/overlapping until you have a nice full skirt and all of your petals are used up.  The smallest petals should be on the outside of the skirt and the longest petals should be against the legs.
  • don't worry about hemming any of your petals (or you'll be doing this a long time).

Printable version of these instructions