5 last minute Easter hat parade ideas

Posted in Easter.
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The Easter hat parade is a fun idea in theory, but when your child comes to you at 7pm the night before needing a hat, it’s suddenly not so fun anymore. If you have been caught on the hop this year, here are five ideas you can whip up the night before WITHOUT making a trip to the specialty craft shop.

1. Paper plate Easter crown

You might need to dash to the shops for this one, but only to the supermarket to grab some plain paper plates. Rest assured you definitely won’t have to take on the specialty craft shop. 

What you need:

Mark up the paper plate into eight pie-shaped segments. Now use a craft knife or scissors to cut along the lines: start cutting about 2cm inside the plate’s rim leaving the rim intact. Cut along each line, stopping at the rim each time.

Once you’ve cut all the lines, you should have eight points.  Bend the points upwards to form the crown.

Print out the Easter egg printable on paper or white cardboard, 120gsm light card stock will feed easily through your home printer.  You will need eight eggs, one for each point.

Use crayons, coloured pencils or marker pens to colour in the eggs on the printable. Cut them out.

Once your eggs are coloured and cut, glue one egg to each point of the crown.

That’s it. We’re done here. See? Wasn’t that easy?

Get the full instructions here. 

2. Newspaper Easter bonnet

Image via mayamade

These pretty newspaper hats by mayamade are so simple and you can easily tweak them to fit the Easter theme.

What you need:

  • a large sheet of newspaper
  • masking tape
  • Easter six egg printable (link to Babyology printable)
  • flowers (from the garden)
  • ribbon
  • coloured pencils, crayons or pens
  • glue

Basically all you have to do is place the sheet of newspaper over your child’s head; their head should sit in the centre of the sheet with the corners of the newspaper flopping down.  Bunch the newspaper around your child’s head to form the crown of the hat.

Wind masking tape around like a hat band to define the crown shape of the hat. Now you just need to roll up the edges to form the hat’s brim.

Once that’s done, decorate the hat with coloured-in Easter egg shapes from the printable above, flowers from the garden and a ribbon around the crown.

You can go to mayamade.blogspot.com.au for full instructions on how to make the newspaper hat .

3. Bunny ears cap

Image via rosegal.com

Using this bunny ears cap from rosegal.com as inspiration, you can create a very simple bunny cap for the Easter hat parade. Basically all you have to do is skip the big white bow part, and add bunny ears to your child’s favourite cap.

What you need:

Cut out some bunny ears. Glue the cotton balls around the edges of the ears. Now just glue, staple or tape the ears to the cap. DONE!

You could even cheat this one a little bit with some ears from one of those Hot Dollar shop Easter headbands.

4. Easter swagman hat

The only trouble with this one is: how do you stop your kid from eating the mini eggs before parade time? If you can convince them to wait until after the parade, this hat is a simple but effective showstopper. 

What you need:

  • a wide brimmed hat
  • 12 – 16 mini chocolate eggs
  • string
  • sticky tape
  • skewer

Cut the string into about 12 x 20cm lengths.  Tape a chocolate egg to the end of each piece of string.

Use the skewer to pierce twelve holes around the brim of the hat.

Thread the end of each piece of string through each hole in the brim. Tie a knot in the top to stop the string from falling back through the brim.

Voila. Easter swagman hat.

5. Random objects added to a straw hat Easter hat

Image by athomewithali.net

There is a certain idea that an Easter hat has to be made entirely from scratch. However, one of the easiest ways to fake an Easter hat is to bring in the hat part, ready-made. So grab an old straw hat and just add some Easter-y stuff to it.

What you need:

  • a straw hat
  • flowers (from the garden)
  • ribbon
  • Easter eggs
  • Easter egg printable
  • masking tape
  • glue
  • stapler

The only rule with this hat is: too much stuff is never enough.

Just go to town covering it with cardboard Easter eggs cut-outs (using the Easter egg printable so conveniently provided) ribbon, flowers and real chocolate Easter eggs if you have them.

Use glue, masking tape, a stapler, WHATEVER WORKS, but make that hat look Easter festive. If you can be bothered making a trip to the Hot Dollar shop, grab some “Easter grass” in a packet and bung that on too!

If you need more inspiration, you can check out the full instructions at athomewithali.net.

One final tip

My top tip for parents who are just starting out on their primary school journey is this: buy a hot glue gun. They’re about $15 at the local Hot Dollar shop and they make TIDY work of all this dress-up day stuff you’re going to have to do over the next six years.

Just get one and you won’t be crying over unstuck hat decorations at 9pm the night before Easter hat parade.

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