Saturday, July 17, 2010

Hooded Towel Project

Some weeks before my real estate license exam, I happened across the idea of making hooded bath towels for my kiddos. I found a couple of sites here and here that more or less explained the process. I promised myself that this project would be one of my treats to myself after passing my exam.



Although each of my sources had slightly different instructions with respect to how to make the towel, the concept is easy enough to visualize without too many directions. I needed only one hand towel and two full towels (one hand towel can make two hoods). As far as the actual aesthetic and the issue of pleating, I ended up doing my own mash-up of the directions and took what I liked from both sites. I did my pleating a bit differently, although it isn't really required at all. I also added some different embellishments. I love ric-rac, which I put around the hoods and the bottom of the towels. I also used some grosgrain ribbon to make a trim where the hood meets the rest of the towel and to make Eric and Katie's first intitials on the backs of their towels.



Although I would make a couple of adjustments in the future (such as sewing the hood just a bit higher up on the towel), I was fairly happy with how these turned out:




I love that they have brother-and-sister towels hanging side by side in their bathroom now!

Katie wraps up in her towel after her bath tonight.


In terms of time, this project was quick. I started and did most of it this morning before Katie woke up. I worked on it a couple more times during the day, but we had plenty of time to make blueberry muffins together, have a leisurely family breakfast, work puzzles together, and play with her action figures, so by no means did the project take all day. I would have been done really quickly had it not been for the initials. If I make them more towels someday, there are some really cute iron-on appliques I found at Joann's. However, I really wanted to put their initials on the first set of towels.


I want to note also that a hooded bath towel at Pottery Barn Kids costs anywhere from $20 to $30 depending upon the style and presence of monogramming. I bought all of my towels at Costco (and could probably have gotten them even more cheaply at Walmart or Kohls), and even with the trimming and thread for sewing, I was able to make BOTH towels for less than the cost of the hooded towels at PBK. Not too bad!