I was debating making invitations this week, since Hobby Lobby was having a 40 percent off sale on stamps, but after going to Mizzou After Dark’s Up All Night event Friday, I feel the need to gush about the amazing crafts I saw there.

I just want to take a moment to give some love to Mizzou After Dark. It offers some pretty amazing crafts, delicious food and fun activities like bounce houses, bingo, a retro prom night and more. It’s free, too! Did I mention the crafts?

If you’ve never gone before, you need to start going to these amazing events. I got to make a photo holder, paint a hacky sack and meet some great people, but the thing I was gushing about all night was my fabulous new headband.

To make my headband, I picked out three darling fabric flowers and layered them together to create an ever bigger, more adorable flower. Then I glued that to a black and gold polka dot ribbon and stuck it on a black headband. For a finishing touch, I found three tiny yellow crocheted flowers and glued them right next to the other flower. Other girls around me combined vintage-looking pearl buttons with fabric flowers and ribbons to make their accessories. The result was overwhelming cuteness. I wore my headband the next day and felt like a tiger princess.

With football season coming up and Mizzou still being new to the SEC, it’s pretty important that every Mizzou woman is able to support her school in style, even if she’s on a strict budget, like me. I personally can’t afford to buy all the cute accessories that I find in The Mizzou Store boutique, which is a bummer because I’m in love with pretty things. The new consignment store in the Student Center, Quirks, has some cute accessories that are less than $8, but the selection is limited to what someone else felt like making at the time.

You don’t need to dress in head-to-toe black and gold to show off your fierce Tiger spirit (unless you want to, in which case I won’t judge). You just need to add a pop here and there. Hair accessories are a great way to do that because they’re highly visible and you can literally wear them as a crown of glory when your team wins, or as a symbol of defiance when your team loses and you don’t care because it’s still the best.

Doing a craft like this headband was not only fun but empowering too. Making simple hair accessories is a great way to ease yourself into crafting if you’re not quite sure you’re ready to strip down Grandma’s hope chest and refinish it with blackboard paint.

To be quite honest (and this may have been all in my head), I wasn’t convinced that I could make cute headgear — because only super-cute girls make cute headgear, right?

Making my own fabulous starter headband helped me realize that my usual sweatpants and T-shirt uniform doesn’t limit me as a person. There’s still a Disney princess lurking somewhere inside, and she is fierce.

So there you go! I hope I inspired you to grab your glue gun and start supporting your school this fall. When you’re talking about school spirit, there’s really nothing better than DIY because it all comes from the heart, not the pocketbook. Plus you’ll get to take delight in knowing that your fabulous look is completely one of a kind.

Ladies, I fully expect to be dazzled in the next coming months with your creations. And when I ask you, with a tinge of envy in my voice, where you got such a lovely headband/brooch/scarf/alpine hat, I’ll be disappointed if you give me anything less than a smug smile along with your gleeful statement, “Darling, I made that.”