A quick hat trick

Tonight I'm invited to a party where the host has asked everyone to wear a hat. A lot of nice and fancy hats are problematic when it comes to actually staying on the head, especially if you want to wear your hair down. There are different tricks that can help you and they do depend on your length of hair, but this is how I do it. A caveat is that I've only tried it with light and small hats.

Here is the little hat that I made for my vintage Amidala, with two combs sewn into it to hold it in place.

I've heard that the best way to keep a hat or headpiece on is to french braid your hair and attach it to that. Well I can't make a tight french braid on myself, I've tried. Another trick for shorter hair is to make a mini-bun, but simply twisting a few strands of hair together and tying them with a hair elastic. I tried the mini-bun, but my hair was too long and it didn't end up as a tight mini-bun.

My solution was to make a regular braid that started on one side of the head. I braided it upwards and laid it across the head until I reached the other side. I then put an elastic around it fastened it with two criss-crossed hairpins, and had the end of the braid brushed into the rest of my loose hair.

Then I put the hat on, making sure that the combs gripped into the braid, and now it sits really tight and secure and I don't have to worry about it sliding around or falling off.