How to: Summer Hair Bow/Head Scarf

Hello! Bit hot isn't it? With summer well and truly kicking and the cafe I work in closed for summer, I have found myself with a lot of crafty time on my hands but not a lot of money. Henceforth, lots of cheap tutorials! This one was inspired by my favourite dress, a forest green button down tea frock that I bought last summer at Leeds festival. drawn to its beautiful print, it was waaaay too long for me so i lopped it off at the knee and kept the spare fabric in a box... until now! inspired by the whole two piece matchy trend I've spotted a lot of people sporting recently, and of course, my love of retro fashion, I thought I'd try my hand at showing you all how to make an easy hair band/hair scarf that takes hardly any time to make.

You Will Need:

• Fabric - check it goes round your head with some left over to make the bow. Exact measurements are pointless - everyone's head size is different You can use whatever thickness you like - I normally find 3 inches gives you versatility to go for an alice band style if you fold it over, or a more traditional 50's housewife vibe if you don't. The fun is in the experimentation!
• Pins
• Needle and Thread (or sewing machine)
• Scissors

1)gather your materials - check that your thread is the nearest matching colour you have to your fabric
Iron out fabric and fold into preferred thickness
2)turn fabric inside out, pin edges for a neat finish
3)use tacking stitches to secure into place
4)sew edges together and sew one end up
5)turn inside out and sew, sew the end up
6)tie round head and voila!

What do you think? ignore my frizzy hair, this heat is playing havoc with it and it is badly in need of a good relaxer!

Pretty cute eh? you can experiment with all sorts of thicknesses or even add bead embellishments or embroidered patterns, even better if you can match them to a dress or top. They're great for tucking your hair up in a rush, or if you're like me, hiding your frizzy roots! For a better example, see here for the one I wore (with matching dress) when I interviewed Alt J in Leeds )also a cheeky plug for my other music blog, safetyinsound.com)

How To: Make A Simple Hair Bow

Seen as I'm off uni for the summer, but am pretty skint, I thought I'd start trying out some small, easy and cheap craft tutorials to share with you all on here. I'm definitely no Kirsty Allsopp when it comes to sewing just yet, but in my experience of crafty blogs, it's sometimes nice to see a tutorial that actually makes you think 'I can do that...right now!' without having to rush out for loads of materials you'll only use once or any complicated techniques. So here goes, with hopefully the first of many...

You will need:

• A rectangle of fabric, whatever size and pattern you like or have. I thought gingham would be cute for summer and you can make loads which will all have exactly the same print. For a small bow, I used a rectangle approximately 15cm long and  8cm wide
• Scissors
• Needle and Thread
• Kirby Grip to attach it to hair. Or else a brooch pin/ hair elastic will work just as well depending how or what you are wanting to attach it to.

1)Cut a rectangle of fabric to relevant measurements.

2)Fold the fabric in half longways, and then fold each end in on itself until you have what looks like a garden gate- two flapping 'door's. This will make a smaller, shorter, tighter rectangle which will form your bow. Stitch up the middle to seal this into a small package.

3)Pinch the rectangle in the middle and loop a few stitches to tack it into place

4)Using a spare scrap of fabric or bit of ribbon, sew a simple band around the middle to keep it in place and hide any ugly stitches. This could look quite nice if you used a contrasting fabric too - get creative!

5)Slide a kirby grip into place, or loop some elastic through the band.

6)Wear away! This could also look nice pinned to a cardigan or attached to a ribbon to make a  simple belt to accessorise a plain belt.