DIY and Freebies: DIY Paper Strip Garland

DIY Paper Strip Garland

I’ve had a few comments recently asking about the garland that hangs above my computer in a few of the photos I’ve posted. I made it quite a while ago, and didn’t think much of it until I started getting questions about it! So I thought it might be a good chance to do a quick DIY for you all :)

Here’s what you’ll need:

– Card in your choice of colours (I had 5 different colours)

– Ruler

– Knife

– Cutting mat

– Pencil

– Thread

– Sewing Machine

Step 1.

The garland I made has three different sized pieces of paper:

Small 6cm x 1.5cm (2.4″ x 0.6″)

Medium 7.5cm x 1.5cm (3″ x 0.6″)

Large 10.5cm x 1.5cm (4.1″ x 0.6″)

Using your ruler, pencil, knife, and cutting matt, mark out and cut 1.5cm wide strips from your card. Then mark out and cut the three different sizes above from your strips. You want a variety of colours in a variety of the three sizes (although if you’re doing one similar to mine, you’ll want more ‘medium’ size strips than the other two).

Step 2.

Lay out roughly how you’ll want your garland to look. Mine goes: small, medium, large, medium, small, medium, large, medium, small…. etc.

Step 3.

Thread your sewing machine, keep it on a straight stitch. Pull a good length of thread out from your machine (this will be one end of your garland, so make it as long to give yourself hanging flexibility later). Put the first piece of card under your presser foot and sew across the top. Once you’ve reached the other side of your strip, you want to sew a few stitches without anything under the presser foot so you’ll have some gaps between each strip of card. I did three stitches before feeding in the next strip of card. Keep going until you’ve got the length you desire. Don’t forget to pull another length of thread out of your machine at the end to give yourself flexibility when you go to hang your garland.