My niece Ava had a birthday in May, and I made her a pom-pom tutu for her present (I made Indy a matching one too, though it is currently out of commission thanks to a couple of tears from one of my old childhood swings at Nana and Papa's house). I originally found this idea on pinterest (here), but the tutorial is not in English, and I like my way of doing it better :) I apologize ahead of time for the sort of unclear how-to pictures. Tulle is a hard fabric to photograph! I'll do my best to make up for it in the explanations. If you want to make this and feel unclear about anything, just shoot me an email.

You'll need about 1.5 - 2 yards of tulle (more if you want a fuller skirt or one with more layers). Lay the tulle out length-wise and cut it in half horizontally. These two pieces will become the two layers of your skirt. 

Fold each piece in half separately from left to right, and make a tube be sewing a seam along one side (you can see me seam above, on the right {I'm just going to leave that typo, 'cause it makes me sound like a pirate}). 

Then, using the same sort of motion as when you fold down the ankle while wearing socks, you're going to fold that tube in half, trapping your seam inside, and creating the space where the pom-poms will live. 

Once you've done this to each of your pieces separately, you're going to place one tube inside the other. If you've done it correctly, you will have two separate pockets (like in the photo above), NOT one double layer pocket. I alternated the seams so that there was one on each side. Line up the 4 layers of tulle at the top and go around in a circle pinning them to keep them that way. At this point, you can put your pom-poms in, half of the amount inside each layer.

Measure your elastic around your wearers waste for length, then fold the top of your skirt over, and sew a space slightly wider than your elastic, leaving a couple of inches open so that you can thread it through (I recommend attaching a safety-pin for ease). Then, pull the two ends of your elastic out a little, lay one end over the other and sew a sturdy seam. Push it back inside, close up the opening, evenly space the ruching on the elastic, and I recommend sewing a couple of straight lines (while holding your elastic stretched out) to prevent bunching of the tulle and folding of the elastic. Easy peasy!

Grillin.

One cousin.

The other cousin.

My dad!

My mama!

My sister (being silly, and my brother-in-law looking like he hates life a little bit).

My other sister!

A couple of Saturdays ago now we had the family over to celebrate Tenny's first year with us. I brightened up the kitchen by making some tissue paper banners, the cousins played, we ate burgers and watermelon and homemade ice cream (starting with this recipe for basic instructions and ratios, but substituting a cup of maple syrup for all of the sugar, steeping fresh mint in the cream while it warmed up, and throwing in a cup or so of roughly chopped semi-sweet chocolate). Tenny was gifted great books, clothes, and wooden toys of his very own.

When Indy turned one we had a party with all of our friends, but since then it's felt more right to us to just gather the family together to celebrate birthdays. For one, the number of toys netted from a big party immediately puts us into toy overload (and if the Lord blesses us with many children. . . I mean could you imagine?!) But most importantly, while we gather to bless Tenny, its also an opportunity to recognize what God has done in his (and our) lives over the past year, and to be grateful for everyone who loves and supports us and him and really acts as the village who helps us raise him. As the kids grow older, I hope to make birthday parties an opportunity for them to recognize that and be grateful for the family who loves them and has seen them through another year, and not just a time to get toys. I hope they feel celebrated, but mostly, I hope they feel loved and grateful, and conscious of the greater family to which they belong. As they grow older, perhaps that will mean they will invite a few choice friends who have had an impact on them to join us. We continue to brainstorm ways to make their birthdays another opportunity for them to turn their hearts upwards and outwards.

What does your family do for birthday parties? Do you have a party philosophy?