DIY 20 Minute No Sew Tent

I've seen some great pins on Pinterest for DIY tents. Here are some of my favorite tents and forts I've seen:

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This is the basic tutorial I followed for my tent with a few modifications...
 I was able to create this project for $0 because I already had all of the supplies on hand left over from other projects. Here are the supplies I used:

• 2 old curtain panels
• 3- 3/8" dowel rods
• 4 pieces of scrap wood approximately 2" wide x 4' long
• Piece of ribbon cut to desired length
• Drill with 3/8" bit and 1/4" bit
• Staple gun
• Painter's or masking tape

Step One: I taped my scrap wood pieces together to insure that the holes would be placed in identical spots on each of them. First I taped the front pieces together then the back pieces, making sure to space the holes of all of them at the same distance and to make sure my scrap wood pieces were even in length.

Step Two: I drilled pilot holes into the pairs of taped wood with my 1/4" bit to make sure I didn't split the wood with my larger bit

Step Three: I separated the wood strips and drilled the larger 3/8" holes. I used my dowel rods as guides to make sure that the holes were evenly drilled. I made sure that the dowel rods were snug fitting but had just enough room to move since I wanted to be able to fold the tent closed.

Step Four: I fit one end the dowel rods  through the holes I had drilled for the front and back of the tent.

Step Five: I slid the first curtain panel onto the dowel rod then placed the back pieces of wood onto the dowel. I used light pressure to push down on the strip of wood to make sure the dowel rod was fully wedged in. Then I repeated the process for the other side with my second curtain panel. At this point I had two panels that were attached on one end and not attached to anything on the other end.

Step Six: I started with the first panel and and using my staple gun I stapled the excess fabric to the  the sides of the tent (where the wood strips are). Then I overlapped the second panel making sure to gather the excess fabric so that the curtain didn't sag and stapled it to the wood. Once I finished you couldn't even see the staples (I pulled back some fabric to show it for the picture). And the staples are flush against the wood so I don't have to worry about them catching on clothes or skin.

Step Seven: I added a piece of ribbon about 2 1/2 feet long to the back side of the tent as tendion to make sure that the tent would fall all the way open.

And here is the finished project!

Morning snack in her new tent

It would look great with some fun colored fabric or even ribbon ties instead of staples but I was determined to make it a zero cost project and used what I had on hand. The whole process only took about 20 minutes to put together and my daughter loves it!