Little girls love fairies. These instructions will be useful if you’ve got a fancy dress party to go to , bored children to entertain at home or as a party idea.

Rather than ask your party guests to dress as fairies, suggest they make their own wings instead. Because of the hands-on feature of this idea you may want to invite fewer guests - also, it may work better for slightly older children.

Set up tables in the garden and be prepared for mess. Suggest the guests wear old T-shirts rather than party dresses. Get  supplies:

• Bright colourful tights (large)
• Wire (5-8 feet of steel wire per pair of wings depending on the size of your fairy)
• Glittery fabric paint/jewels/feathers/flowers/3d fabric paint/trailing ivy leaves/big sequins/ribbons/fabric etc etc
• Duct tape
• Coloured Elastic for holding the wings onto the fairy (or if the straps must be invisible try looking for clear bra straps in the shops)
• Wire snips
• Strong pliers, especially if you want to bend your wings into funky wing shapes
• Needle & thread

Shape the wire into a figure 8. Next, secure the middle with duct tape and trim off any sharp ends. If you’re making very fancy wings try leaving some extra for making into a spiral underneath. Remember to cover the ends so that you don’t get spiked! If your wire is flexible enough, bend the ends into a loop.

If you’ve put spirals onto your wings you’ll need to wrap them in ribbon or a long tube of coloured fabric. (You may want to use the leftover parts of the tights if there’s enough.

Using just the legs of the tights (cut off the tops), stretch them over each wing pulling them tight and securing at the bottom. If you’ve made your wings into a complicated shape you’ll need to sew the tights at strategic places around the wire. Secure the ends if need be with duct tape to hold them in place.

Use more tape to hold the straps on - make them long enough to be comfortable but short enough that the wings won’t sag. The tape will need to be covered now; use a loop of fabric, paint it, wrap it in ribbon or cover it with a large flower.

Don’t forget to get a good combination of colours - Gothic fairy wings look great when made from black tights, then use a combination of black and gray or lace to decorate.

Depending on how creative you feel (and how much free time you can set aside) you may decide to make the wings in advance of your little guests arriving - whereas if you have the patience you may be happy to supervise them through the making process. If you’re a real angel perhaps you’ll have them sleep over and wear them (allowing for plenty of drying time) in the morning!

Alternatively try these sites to buy professionally made wings: Off With The Faries or Fairy Love!