Patriotic Party at the Beach

My family all gathered at Bethany Beach for the week of the Fourth of July.  Since there would be a dozen of us on the holiday, buying patriotic hats for everyone would have cost too much money.  Having made hats with first graders for so many years, I took my fun foam skills and applied them to this holiday.  We started with long strips for the headbands.  I cut the large 11" x 17" strips into thirds (the long way).  Then I cut one of those strips into thirds (the fat way).  Then I glued the smaller strip onto the longer strip to make a headband long enough for an adult's head.  I brought my stapler and tacky glue with me on the trip.  This took the intimidation factor away from everyone.  We just helped measure each others' bands around their heads and stapled them for the correct fit.

Here is one of my "adopted" kids.  My daughter's friends have become so close to our family, that one by one they've become an integral party of our family.  Trevor married into the family and is now the father of my "adopted" grandson.  He is wearing my original hat pattern.  I cut the white foam strip in the same manner as the red band, gluing on the extra strip for head circumference.  I simply then folded the longer extended white foam piece in half (the long way) and cut into the fold to make a lantern.  Once I had opened it and refolded it the opposite way,  and glued and stapled it into the red band. I then folded the top half of the lantern down into the red band to make the loops.

I didn't have enough white fun foam to do this for everyone.  I bought out all the red, white, and blue sheets our Michael's sold, but Uncle Sam took a LOT of foam.  So, I folded the white sheets (the long way) and cut them in HALF this time.  I again folded one of the white strips into THIRDS for the extensions and glued them onto the longer strips.  The family could cut these strips in any manner they liked. They just had to leave a 3" wide edge that had glue on it.  This edge was glued into the top half of the red band.  I took a small glass and added water to the tacky glue in it--so that they could "paint" the glue onto the foam.  

If you look at the second hat from the right, that is Trevor's WAVE pattern.  His wife Rachel took a pen and curled her white strips, while my niece Valerie cut her strips into thin grass-like strips.  She and her fiance, Steve dropped by for the afternoon for the festivities.  They left to have dinner with their friends in Ocean city. I double-dog-dared them to wear the hats out to dinner.  See below.

Val texted me this photo with the message that everyone in the restaurant was taking pictures of them and wanted to know where they got the hats.

I bought glittery stars, flags, Fourth of July  foam stickers at Michael's.  I also pre-cut lots of fun foam stars.

We had a hat contest and asked people walking on the beach past us to judge.My daughter Maryanne was the winner. 

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My husband, Buzz, the architect, only came in second.  He was sure his multi-tiered hat would win with it's hand cut "Happy Fourth" sign on the front.  My daughter Annie's hat had stars on strips.  She's an interior designer and thought she had a shoe-in win.  What she did do was cause a one-up-manship for the rest of the crowd.

                                              Even the baby wore a hat.

            Are you too cool to wear a hat?  Even my son got into the spirit.

I thought my Uncle Sam was so tall, but my future nephew Steve is even taller.  Because Sam is made with insulation and fun foam, he is waterproof.  We took the shark I made last summer right into the ocean.  

  If you want to see how I made Uncle Sam and missed the post, go to  Uncle Sam HERE

I hope all of you had as much fun on the Fourth of July as we did.  The hurricane blew through, but we didn't let it bother us.  I saw a sign in one of the shops over there that said, "DON'T WORRY ABOUT THE FORECAST.  LEARN TO DANCE IN THE RAIN."

--Jani