Little Dancers
I can’t imagine that my girls are alone in their love to dance around the living room to awesome music. It is even more exciting when Mommy joins in. And when you’ve got some Irish jigs playing it can be quite the workout!
Ella and I recently watched the old, free version of The Nutcracker Ballet on Amazon Prime, and it has served to inspire even more living room dance sessions. If my girls are going to dance around the living room on tip toes then their experience will be that much better if they are wearing tutus right? This is especially true for Ella, having seen the tutus and flowing dresses of the ballerinas in The Nutcracker. The proper attire can make all the difference!
Supplies for a Tutu
I didn’t want to have to find and pay for little tutus though, especially when I can make them so inexpensively! So, the next time we were out shopping, I picked up a few supplies. These tutus are so simple, and I already had elastic, buttons, and thread, so all I needed was tulle and ribbon. I got a roll of 6 inch wide tulle that was 25 yards long for each tutu, and a roll of coordinating 1 1/2 inch wide fabric ribbon that was 9 feet long. So for each tutu the supplies I had to buy were only $5!
The Skirt
To start, I got my sewing machine out and just started sewing straight, on the longest stitch length it has, about 5/8 inch from the edge of the tulle. I sewed and sewed and sewed, all 25 yards of tulle! Every so often I would stop, pull out a little bit of thread and clip it and start again so that I would have tails in the middle to use for gathering. It actually made it easier to pause and gather a few sections at a time so that it didn’t get out of hand, and then continue sewing.
Gathering
To gather the tulle I picked up one of the thread ends and pulled it gently, sliding and ooching the tulle down it to gather it all together. Now maybe my sewing machine does not have the proper tension balance, but I found that it was much MUCH easier to gather by pulling on the top thread than the bottom one. When I had gathered a section, I would do my best to keep it tight while tying a knot between the thread end that I just pulled, and the thread end of the next section. Then I moved on to gathering the next section.
Once I had gathered all the tulle, I measured it to see how long it was. It measured 36 inches, but even with my careful gathering it was still a bit uneven in fullness. So I hand gathered it a second time to 30 inches and was able to even out the fluff.
Hand gathering tutu with fairly large stitches right below the machine stitching 
Tutu skirt tightened down to 30 inches
Sizing and adjustability
Ella’s waist measures 23 1/2 inches, so I wanted the finished tutu to be able to be pulled to 23 inches. Also, if I was going to put this much effort into making her a tutu, I didn’t want her to grow out of it by the next week, so I also wanted it to be comfortable at 26 inches, just in case.
I decided to make the waistband adjustable, kind of like some of the jeans that they sell in stores. To do this I cut a section of 3/4 inch elastic to 26 inches. I then stitched 4 button holes on one end of the elastic down the center ranging from 22 inches to 25 inches. For the waist band I took the ribbon off the spool and folded it in half. I pinned and stitched the non-button-hole end of the elastic into the center crease of the ribbon. I tucked the elastic out of the way before pinning and stitching from the fold down one of the sides of the ribbon, to 30 inches from the fold.
Marking where to put button holes 
My untidy but functional buttonholes 
Tucking elastic into center fold of ribbon 
Stitching the top side of the ribbon sandwich (without catching the elastic though)
The waistband
To make the tutu’s waistband adjustable, I needed to put a button hole in the waistband too for the elastic to be threaded through in order to be tightened. So, I stitched a buttonhole with the center at about 27 inches from the folded end on the inside half of the ribbon band. I also needed a button to hold the elastic at the right level of tightness, so I sewed on one about an inch or so from the button hole (about 28 1/2 inches from the folded end).
Adding button hole and button to inside half of ribbon waistband
Putting it all together
Then next step was to pin the elastic into the band as far from the open edge as possible so that it wouldn’t get caught in the next seam. After securing the elastic out of the way, I pinned the waistband onto the gathered tulle and stitched it, being careful not to catch any of the fluffs that wanted to get in the way.
Once that was done, I pulled the elastic through the button hole to cinch the tutu up a little. (A safety pin, placed through the last button hole in the elastic before sewing on the waist band, made this process much easier). Once I had pulled the elastic through the button hole in the ribbon, I stitched the end of the elastic down with a zig-zag stitch to keep it from being pulled back through the button hole and lost forever.
Safety pin for easy pulling 
Fighting with the fluff to pin on waistband 
Stitching it all together
That safety pin was handy 
Then came the exciting steps to connect the ends and transform it from a long line of fluffiness into a tutu! I sewed the ends together by tucking the folded end inside the open end. I pinned and stitched it in place and then trimmed the tails and, folding them under I stitched them down too.
Tuck folded end into loose end 
Pinned in place ready to sew 
All done…
Yay! Finished tutu!
But wait! Something is missing…..
Finishing touches
A BOW!
There! Adjustable dancy fluffiness of fun for five dollars!
I would like to be able to say that these were “two hour tutus” but I’m afraid that would be lying. Now that I’ve done two of them it might be closer to that, but it does take quite a long time to gather all of that tulle! But it is definitely worth it! And, you could certainly save yourself some time and trouble if you didn’t want it to be adjustable, but rather having a simple elastic waistband.
All a blur 
And it just keeps getting better! These scarves are the best!
After a few days of wear, I can say that I would probably recommend buying better tulle–one that doesn’t pull quite as much. This cheap Walmart stuff doesn’t hold up very well and keeps getting pulls in the edges. And, yanking out the dangling pulled threads creates holes along the edge. But the amount of fun that these tutus have given has not be reduced, though their overall appearance may have been. It is still totally worth the time and effort and money to make these even if Walmart supplies are all that is available to you!
And I might add that the living room is not the limit of the places that Ella wants to wear her tutu. She has worn it shopping, to a music class, and would wear it for meals and to bed if she were allowed. It is definitely a new favorite. 🙂
