Fabric Ice Cream Cones

I thought these were too cute to pass up.  I saw these on Friday and knew I had to make them!  I see an ice cream party in our future and these will be great decorations.

The original tutorial is from icing designs online.  I will post the link at the end of the post. 

But maybe I can save you some time and money with a few tips I learned from making these.

Originally it called for using 2 1/2 inch styrofoam balls.  You can NOT use regular green or white styrofoam balls.  They are too lumpy and bumpy and once you try and cover them with your fabric it looks awful.  You need to use Smooth Foam balls.  I was only able to locate 3-inch balls from Michael's.  But they worked out just fine.

Since I used larger styrofoam balls I had to make my fabric circle bigger, so I cut a 9-inch circle paper template to use for cutting out my fabric circles.

I also made my own cone template since I had the larger ball size.

Since fabric is pricey I only bought 1 yard of each color.  Once I cut my fabric into 36" long x 1 1/2 inch strips, I cut one of the strips in half  and sewed it together with a regular length to make a longer piece of fabric to ruffle.  You won't be able to see the seam once you start to ruffle your fabric strip.

Before making the ruffles ensure you use pinking shears and cut down both sides of the strips.

I thought I might be able to just baste stitch down the length of fabric and pull on the threads in order to get the ruffles.  This made the pleats but it was way to uniform looking.  So use your sewing machine to get organic looking ruffles.  My finished ruffle length was about 21 inches.

To assemble:
Cover styrofoam ball with one piece of 9 inch fabric.  Gather fabric around ball and apply hot glue towards bottom of ball to secure fabric to ball.  Try to have tight gathers and pull the fabric smooth as much as you can.  Work little sections at a time.  Remember it will sit inside a cone so does not have to be perfect at bottom.

Cut out your ice cream cone pattern.  I made my own cone pattern since I was using larger balls.  I also used textured cardstock which made them very sturdy.  I used double sided tape to gather cone sides together and secure.

Place hot glue around inner opening of cone and place your fabric covered ball in opening.  I applied a little bit of pressure to ensure it adhered.

Next I took one of my ruffles lengths and hot glued it around the top of cone and lower part of fabric.  You can twist it as you wrap it around the cone if you like.

In order to hang up I used a very small stick pin and  ribbon pushed into top center of cone.

Original tutorial and instructions can be found here:  Icing Designs Online.

Linked to Skip to My Lou, made by you monday.