Why yes, I did make another garland. Thank you for asking. This time the garland is for a very special occasion....
Baby B....
is turning....
ONE!
That just can't be right. I'm sure my calendar is broken because I just brought him home yesterday! But just in case my calendar is, in fact, correct and an entire year has flown by, I better get ready to celebrate his big day! We're planning just a small, simple get together with a few friends & family. As usual, we're keeping it pretty cheap and easy (with a backyard cookout), and keeping our eyes on the main goal - to have fun celebrating Baby B's first year of life with the people we love!
Being me, there will be some thrifty decorations involved because I love to dress up my house! I picked up a few supplies from Hobby Lobby & Dollar Tree to combine with things I already had on hand....
Doesn't that just look like little boy birthday goodness? I am in LOVE with that dino felt - but it's for another day. :) My first project was making a pennant garland to string all around the party grounds! I first saw the idea
here and decided to adapt the colors to fit a my little mister.
I started by cutting out a BUNCH of little pennants from red, blue, & yellow cardstock. I used colors I already had and just cut until I ran out of sheets. I ended up with a pretty big pile for $0! They are really easy to make, just cut small strips of paper, fold them in half, and clip the ends to make a flag shape. I did spend about $2.50 on some nice cotton twine for stringing my pennants (from Lowe's).
To make the garland, I started by leaving about 2 feet of string at the beginning (so I'll have plenty of slack for tying up my garland). Then I used a hot glue gun to put a small dot of glue near the fold of each flag and stuck down the string. I also put a teeny dot at the bottom of each flag to help keep it closed, but I don't know that it was really necessary. Then I folded the flag down and held it in place for a second so it wouldn't pop back open. Note: hot glue is actually quite hot, so be careful holding down your flags. I would tell you how many times I burned my fingers, but I can't even count that high. My flags are all different sizes, but I wanted them evenly spaced so it would still look tidy. The easiest way for me to do that was to use a spacer to separate each one. I just used a little plastic thing that I liked the size of (it's in the background below) but you could use a quarter or a toothpick or even a piece of paper cut to size.
I just kept gluing until I ran out of flags! I left a long tail on the end again for tying it up. I have no idea how long it is, but it has to be huge. Or I'm just optimistic. I guess we'll find out on party day! Until then I wrapped it around a paint color card to keep it from getting tangled. I LOVE how it turned out and can't wait to see it in action. And I plan to hang it around Baby B's room after the party. :)
Do you have any big events coming up? Do you ever make your own garlands? Do you think my calendar is broken?
UPDATE: The garland turned out great and added the perfect touch of birthday cheer to the house!
P.S. While I was typing this, Baby B took off walking all over my parents' house for the first time. It was crazy and I'm SO glad I packed the video camera! I guess he wanted to be officially walking before his birthday! :)
