They’re these giant flowers that Texas girls wear to a Friday night Homecoming Football game once a year. They’re huge and they’re awesome.

And this year, because 2020 is just the craziest kind of year, we don’t just have homecoming mums, we have homecoming MASKS, too.

That’s right, you can get your very own Homecoming masks to match your big ‘ol Texas mum.

This is what I love about Texas.

I love that if we’ve got to wear masks, we are going to do it in style.

Happy Homecoming!

“A lady came in and spent $700 on a mum.” That was the text I received last night from a friend who works part time in a local boutique. While I don’t want to go off on a social or political rant, it had my WTF antennae on high alert, thinking…WHAT THE ACTUAL EFF? That’s a car payment.  A really nice car payment. And it’s more than the monthly mortgage on my first house.

This can’t be what they intended. They being those who started the tradition. With the first commercial chrysanthemum corsage associated with football dating back to the 1940’s and a fundraiser for some Baylor University frat dudes, something tells me the “they” don’t really care. Yet as the years have passed, the simple, hardy fall flower with a couple of ribbons and bows, held to an even simpler dress by a small safety pin, has morphed into garishly fake status symbol of “my boyfriend/best friend/parents/big sister/little sister/dog loves me more than yours loves you” and has to be harnessed on with heavy ribbon, spit, and prayers.

MUMS THE WORD!

Back in the day when mums were real.

It goes against the laws of physics she’s even upright.

Beautiful girls, but it’s totally obvi who’s more popular.

This is a back injury waiting to happen…or a cross fit workout, however you want to look at it.

For the love of Beyonce! Not you too!

Be thankful this mum is battery operated. It would overload the power grid faster than suburban thermostats set to seventy on a one hundred and ten degree day. But as this picture shows, the helping of madness isn’t only heaped on the girls participating in the Homecoming festivities. To prove we aren’t always a sexist society, the boys are compromising their future man cards and joining in the fun.

All I can say, son, is you must love your GF a lot…or your mom made you do this. Either way, smile through the pain, buddy. Smile through the pain.

Baby, you can get away with anything when you’re that cute.

Not all High School students are drinking the kool-aid spiked with mum crazy. The purpose for which the mum tradition began has come full circle. Only these students are donating the proceeds to charity rather than contributing to the fraternity row beer fund (okay, so maybe that’s not actually how it happened, but don’t pretend frat boys, even at Baylor in the 40’s, didn’t drink beer). Here’s just one of many stories about how students are dialing it down and raising money to help others.

Do I think the Homecoming mum tradition has taken on a life of it’s own, becoming an I’ve-got-more pissing contest? Yes! Do I think the tradition should be abolished? Heck no! Even silly and over-done, I’m hoping for my little Texans it’ll end up being a lasting memory of creativity and fun for some of the best years of their lives. But unlike good chocolate and Robert Downey, Jr., where you can never get enough, less really is more.

Denim hair bows are super cute, easy to make and only require a few supplies. The best part is, you can wear them in your hair, make them for your little girl or give them away as gifts!

What You Need To Make a Fabric Hairbow:

• 2- 3 ½ by 2 inch pieces of  fabric (honestly, this can be ANY size depending on how big you want your bow to be)
• 1- 2 by ¾ inch piece of fabric, for bow strap
• Needle
• Thread
• Scissors
• Fabric safe glue or hot glue gun
• Alligator clip
• Pins

How To Make a Fabric Hairbow:

1. Grab your two larger pieces of fabric and place one on top of the other, ensuring that the side you want displayed is not visible. You want the wrong side of the fabric shown.
2. Line them up and use two pins to hold in place. After placing your pins, sew around the perimeter to attach both pieces of fabric.
3. When sewing is complete, grab your scissors and cut a small slit in the center on one side making sure not to puncture the other. This slit is required in order to turn the bow right side out.
4. Turn the bow inside out, ensuring that all four corners are nice and neat. Use the end of your scissors to push out corners.
5. Pinch the center with your index finger and thumb and add a few stitches to secure the pleats created. Now, grab your small fabric piece and fold the sides in lengthwise. Wrap around the bow and sew in order to create the strap. Cut off any excess fabric.
6. To attach the alligator clip, add a few small drops of glue on the top of the clip and secure to the bow.

Making a fabric hair bow is easy. In just a few simple steps you can create a beautiful hair accessory. Try experimenting with different sizes and fabric selections to create a bow that is all your own!

We used the video tutorial below for making a bon bon bracelet, and just made an extra long extender for the under part. (You don’t want it to be too bulky, so you just want the fun design on the top of your head.) Have fun!

You start off with fancy duct tape. I got mine here. Just stick it down to a solid headband. (I usually get mine at the dollar store. They come in packs of five or so.)

Trim the edges of the tape, but leave a little so you can fold it over to the bottom side of the headband, and you’re done! You have a custom duct tape headband, and you are totally rocking’ it!

So, we got to work and made this! It took about two minutes and it’s the cutest flower headband. I am going to make about a million more of them.

I cut the mesh off the back of the flower, added some hot glue to a yellow headband I got at the dollar store, and stuck it down. It really was that easy to make a custom headband. I am going to give them to out as birthday presents!

All you need is some of that cute patterned duct tape you can find at pretty much any store, and a small hair clip. Watch the video below for instructions.

You can Get Google Eyes and Headbands Here:

The other day I asked my daughter if she thought it would be cute to put a google eye on a hair clip and she FREAKED out. She told me it was pretty much the best idea I’d ever had, so I figured I’d better share it here on the blog. Here are my instructions for a DIY Google Eye Hair Clip!

It’s pretty simple, basically you just glue the google eyes to the edge of your hair clip, and you have the coolest hair clip EVER!

You can get google eyes here:

You can get the barrettes I used here:

It’s SO easy to make, that I almost don’t need to give you step by step instructions, but since I love you– I’ll do it anyway.

You need 20 inches of 3 inch wide black Ribbon (well, that was just the size I had on hand, you could seriously make this little guy out of any size ribbon), two google eyes, some hot glue, and a hair clip.

• Tie a big knot in the middle of your ribbon. Play around with it so it sort of looks like a bat’s body.
• Cut the edges in a curve. (If you had zig-zag scissors, you could even use those!)
• Glue the eyes on to the big knot.
• Turn the bow over and glue the hair clip to the back, and BAM you have a super awesome bat hairbow you made yourself!

Here’s the Ribbon I used:

Here are the Google Eyes I Used:

Happy Haunting!

Want to know hot to make a cheer bow from Duct Tape? Here’s a video tutorial!

And so… new year, new cheer bow!

So I googled, “How to Make a Cheer Bucket” and came up with about two hits.

Craap. That meant I was on my own. Turns out, though– they’re not all that difficult. You just hit the after homecoming sales, pick up some cute dangly football stuff and some cute cheerleader stickers– grab some fuzzy boa material and some of that cute colored/patterned duct tape, and you’re good to go.

First things first– you need a bucket. You can find these at wal-mart and I went with green because– hey that’s the team color– why not?

Then take some of that duct tape and tale around the bottom. It’s harder than it looks, because the bucket isn’t straight– now take your boa, wrap it around the top, and tie some super cute football mum things to it.

For the top, we just used a bandana and a piece of round foam, my husband drilled holes in the bucket lid and tied the bandana together underneath the lid.

As for the handle– that’s just tulle, various ribbons, and christmas tinsel tied in knots.

Pretty easy if you ask me!

Well, I ended up at the yellaribbon site. Get it? Cheerleaders yell—so they wear yellaribbons? I’m not going to lie… I love a good play on words. They have the ultimate cheer bows there. They’re sparkly, shiny, and sure to give your girls 1000% more pep.** You can see my favorite one here. I did an internet search for “how to make a yella ribbon” and when that didn’t turn up anything… I realized I was going to have to teach myself. Now I know how to make the cutest cheer bow ever, and I wrote up this little tutorial (aside: did you know they call them “tuts” on craft sites? Why do I hate that so much?) and you will too.

***Don’t forget to click the pictures to see a larger version***

Why yes, yes internet–I am aware that my daughter looks like a tiny beauty queen here, but she really loves cheering… so I just pretend not to notice.

First, we need to cut the ribbon.

• You need two pieces of 7/8″ Ribbon and one piece of 1 1/2″ Grossgrain Ribbon, all three should be 30″ long. Don’t worry about making the ends cute yet–we’ll get to that.

Now, it’s time to sew the ribbon together.

• Don’t put the ribbons on top of each other. Instead, lay them side by side and use a little zig sag stitch to grab the edges of both ribbons. You’ll have to play with your machine a bit to see which setting is best, but I had mine set at 1.5 for both settings. This step isn’t an absolute necessity, but these are cheer bows, and the last thing you want is for them to break apart mid-competition.

Don’t worry that they’ll be all wonky looking when you’re finished.

• Just try to keep the stitch as straight as you can and grab both ribbons. It doesn’t have to be perfect–we’ll cover the front part with fabric later–but the stitch will show on the back of your bow, so don’t go crazy or anything.***

Iron your new giant ribbon.

• This is my favorite part–which is weird, because normally I hate ironing.

Okay now it’s time to add the awesome.

Lay out the super shiny fabric you’ve chosen for your cheer bow.

• (Hint: most cheerleading uniform companies use Mystique Spandex**** on their uniforms- so if you can’t find something to match at a craft store, you can probably find an exact match online.)

Now, you have two choices here, you can either iron Heat’n Bond Strips to the back of your spandex and cut them out, or you can iron a big piece of Heat’n Bond and then cut out the strips.

• I suck at the rotary so I needed the guide the pre-cut strips provided for me–but you can do it either way.

Lay them down on the back of your shiny material and iron them on.

• Now you just have to cut out the strips. (I did several at a time so I didn’t waste a lot of material.)

(Don’t panic, I didn’t turn into a dude or anything–he’s just better at cutting straight lines than I am.)

It’s time to iron on the strips.

• You don’t want to put your iron directly on the spandex, it might melt. So use a towel or cheesecloth in between. It doesn’t have to be fancy–you’re just trying to keep the fabric from ruining.

Do them one at a time!

• And do it a little piece at a time because spandex stretches when it’s hot–it also gets WAY hot super fast, so BE CAREFUL! When you’re done with one side, it should look like this:

Now, you can flip it over and iron the heck out of it.

• I had my iron set to cotton, and it worked just fine–even with the ribbon that had the ironed on dots. You want to make sure it sticks really good, because in a minute we’re going to be squishing things thing all over the place, and you don’t want it to come apart.

Cut the ends into fish tails.

• I recommend folding it over like this:

And cutting at a diagonal.

They should come out pretty even.

• Run a lighter along the edges to prevent fraying. I’ve tried several different methods (fray check, wood burner, etc.) but I always go back to the lighter. Just be careful not to melt your spandex too much.

Now, fold your ribbon in half and put a dot in the very middle with a pen or a marker.

• Just be careful not to let it bleed too much. (My fingers look crazy weird in this picture–what gives?)

We’re going to use a template to make the loops, but you don’t have to.

• These are so easy to make. Just take a piece of cardstock and cut it to 7″ x 10″ then cut a tiny strip in the middle. It just has to be big enough for you to see the dot you made.

Now, fold the ribbon over and slide it off the template.

Once you’ve done that, squish your ribbon together.

• Now, when we put the zip tie on, it already has a memory of how it’s supposed to look.

Wrap a zip tie around the middle and pull it half way tight.

• Leave enough room so you can move the ribbon around to shape the bow. If you mess it up, just cut off the zip tie and start all over.

Once you have the bow looking exactly how you want it to, use pliers to pull it super tight.

• Make sure the big part ends up on the back of your bow, toward the bottom–that way it won’t show through anywhere.

Cut the end of the zip tie.

• This is what your bow is going to look like, so if you don’t like the shape, then don’t use any glue until you’re satisfied.

Now, we need to hot glue the ponytail holder.

• Don’t use the thin ponytail holder–they’ll break.
• I recommend Scunci No Slip Ponytail Holders, but they’re sort of expensive–so if you’re making a lot of these, you might want to just go with a regular scunci ponytail holder that doesn’t have any metal.
• Once you have that glued, let it sit until the hot glue is dry, that’s an important part of the bow–you want to make sure it’s on.
• I usually dab a little more hot glue on top to make sort of a seal.

Now, take about four inches of 7/8″ ribbon.

• Heat seal the ends and tie a little knot in the center.

Hot glue the center knot to the front of the bow.

• I always do this part first so I don’t have to worry about the knot ending up at the wrong spot on the bow.

Use as much hot glue as you can without it squirting out the sides and making a big mess to wrap the ribbon around the bow.

• Do the bottom first, then the top–that way you won’t have the edges sticking out of the top of the bow–it will be on the lower back where no one can see it.

Here’s the finished bow!

Don’t forget to make some for the rest of the team–you don’t want your daughter to be the only one with a totally awesome super cute cheer bow, now do you?

If you have any questions, leave them in the comments below, and I’ll answer them if I can!

*read: distraction from what I’m actually supposed to be doing

**Seriously, you realize this is a bogus claim, right?

***I just imagined a bunch of crafty divas going crazy–it’s not pretty.

****As someone who just searched for that term while sitting in the coffee shop… let me warn you to make sure your safe search is on.