Crafting the Bunny’s Chapeau

Although Easter has passed, I still have more to show you from the holiday.  I thought I'd tell you how we created Guncle Randy's bunny hat.

We started with a magnificent, pink, wool top hat.  Which would have been great as is!

But we wanted it to be even more bunnified.  So I tucked Easter grass under the band.

Over the band, I wrapped a white velvet ribbon and pinned it in place, then glued one end of the white ribbon to the other end of the ribbon, overlapping a bit.  Our issue was, that we didn't know if the hat would need to be returned to its original glory. I don't sew, I am a die hard glue-er.  But- we were not sure if we should let any glue touch the already pretty pink hat.

The white velvet ribbon became the new hat band, placed over the existing band and everything was glued to the white one.

Including the wired ears.

Using The Ultimate Glue, I layered vintage millinery flowers to the  ribbon, then to each other, building a full bouquet to add more grass, eggs, and bugs to.

My plan had been to use brighter, less tattered flowers….

But the ones I had packed were lost on the flight, due to a broken zipper on my suitcase!!!! (Along with a crop-o-dile, lace, ribbons, rhinestones, Tim Holtz scissors, more flowers, gel pens, and a bottle of glue)

Well, at least it was a good excuse to buy a new suitcase for the trip home! And a much prettier one at that.

Funny, for a person who lost most of her flowers, I seemed to have plenty left.  These were packed elsewhere for me to use in the classes I was going to take at the event.  I had forgotten that I had a ton of vintage floral packets with me that I had planned on selling on Vendor Night, so there was no shortage of flowers that weekend.  I just didn't get to use the ones I had planned on using on the hat.

But I like the way these look, so it all turned out fine.

The sides and back were decorated too.  But less heavily than the front.

It was clumsy to try to glue things to the new band and to each other, not to the hat itself, and it is all put together like a house of cards.  But this way, if Randy ever wants to wear a plain, pink top hat, all he needs to do is pull off that white ribbon. Everything will come off in a big bundle.

Luckily, this wire and bead posy was not lost in the luggage fiasco, because it fit perfectly into this old knife handle transformed into a boutonniere holder.

My baby bro and I had a blast making these together.  Our collaborated projects are always so much fun!