Kids in an Old Fashioned Table Tent
My children have the day off from public schoolhouse today (Happy Martin Luther King, Jr day!) and one of their favorite things to practice is to brand forts – what kid doesn't?
Knowing how much they beloved them, I made them a play tent in our dining room in the shape of a white tablecloth, complete with delightfully sweet curtained windows and a door for access too.
Who says dining rooms are just for eating? Not so at our firm!
I cannot accept credit for this creative plan… my kids have been making tents out of tabletops for years (yours too?). But then I saw a made to order custom playhouse tablecloth from a shop in Due south Africa and I thought now that is a totally brilliant thought!
I came up with a DIY version and gave it my own twist. I loved the defunction on the "windows" but I wanted a more than discreet opening on the side and colors that would complement our home. I made the tablecloth and door with white fabric and the window panels from kitchen towels found at Target and information technology turned out sooo very cute!
To recreate it, all you need is enough fabric to cover the tabletop and the surround, and accent fabric for windows (or doors) plus a sewing motorcar and thread. And a few hours of fourth dimension!
I've made tailored tablecloths before and I adopt not to buy the more expensive linen/cotton textile, instead I use mantle liner because information technology'southward thick, affordable, and is 54" wide. Drapery liner is rather heavy and you can buy it for $iv-v a chiliad if you discover it on auction – I bought mine from Joann'southward with a coupon.
You need enough to embrace the table and wrap around and every tabular array'south measurements are unlike. If you're lucky and your tabletop is no more than 26" tall, you tin can cut the drapery liner in half to salvage a lot of dough, simply mine is 29" tall then I had to buy yardage to wrap all the way effectually – a total of eight ½ yards. 
The construction is pretty basic… first cutting the acme piece and then hem the additional material to the edges of the top, turning it at the corners – I apply pins to marking them.
When information technology was all stitched together, I pinned the lesser and hemmed that adjacent.
I saved a scrap for the door, cutting open a doorway with scissors, hemming the edges of the scrap, then stitching a flap to the finished tablecloth tent.
To make the window panels, I cut each towel in half and pleated the upper portion of the curtain with the sewing machine, tucking the edges on both sides as I sewed.
In one case they imitation panels were pleated I cut out a pigsty for the windows.
And so I sewed the panels to the tops of the cutout windows – imperfectly sewn to the tablecloth, but oh well! 
Information technology turned out so darn cute, there won't be any rush to take it down . . .
… and it will be perfect for those many rainy winter days when we're all stuck indoors!
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