We have a deep love for mermaid dresses around here. Little girls feel EXTRA magical when they put on a mermaid dress and it makes me so happy to see that joy!
Last year I made a criss-cross mermaid dress that turned out better than I had imagined! This year I followed it up with a twirly mermaid dress, and now this simple mermaid dress. Each dress is adorable in its own way, but they are in descending order of the amount of time needed to make the dress. Today's tutorial is one of the easiest dresses to make!
All you need for this dress is a tutu top, tulle, scissors, a measuring tape, a crochet hook, and a couple pearl embellishments. I used teal tulle for the dress (it looked a bit darker in person) and aqua tulle for the accent strands along the bottom.
Determine the length you'd like your dress.The best thing to do is measure a pair of her pants to get the best length. Take that number and double it. I wanted my dress to be about 24" long, so my tulle needed to be 48" long.
Use your crochet hook to help with this next part. It's possible to create a dress without one, but it takes much longer. Just buy a hook! (We carry them in our Tutu Making Kit.)
Begin on the second row of holes. Your tulle will be looped around the cloth square on the lowest row. Make sense? Push the crochet hook from the inside of the headband through to the outside. (Since I was dealing with a lined headband, I needed to thread it from the very base of the headband up through the hole.) Fold a strand of tulle in half and grab the loop with the hook. Pull it through. Then grab the two ends of the tulle strand and thread them through the tulle loop. (Check out the photos above if that sounds confusing. It's really easy!)
Just keep going until your crochet headband is full. I made this dress one layer but in hindsight, I'd do two layers. Girls over four years old should usually have dresses that are at least two layers to keep it from being see-through.
Once your dress is created, cut strands of aqua tulle about 12" long. Tie them 6" up from the base of the dress. The result will be a fin-like flare.
For the top of this dress, I just cut long strands of teal tulle. I feed two strands through a hole on the front of the dress and pulled them halfway through. I did the same on the other side. The long strands then became a halter top that I tied around the back of her neck. To cover the looped tulle in the front, I stitched pearl accents on each side.
If you have any questions while crafting this or any of tutu dress, feel free to email me directly at ruffles@thehairbowcompany.com. Happy crafting!