Doily Garland Tutorial

How about a tutorial today? Over the weekend I got crafty and made up this little Valentine's Day garland. It's actually a bit longer than this, but if I zoom out too far to show the whole thing the photo doesn't pick up the details as well.

I was inspired by the lovely garlands in Kristina Marie's etsy shop. They are all too gorgeous!! I especially love the ones that she makes that are layered in doilies, like this one.

To make my own version, I started with some doilies I picked up at Target (along with some other goodies). The 20 count pack of small hearts was in the $1 section, and the larger packs were with the Valentine's Day items and were $1.99.

Then I dove into my collection of paper punches and picked out a few that I thought might work well. In retrospect, the 1" circle and square were good choices, along with the larger detailed butterfly. The smaller shapes and small butterflies were too small to be able to control well while feeding them through the sewing machine.

The doilies are too intricate to attack with my ATG gun, so I pulled out my trusty Xyron instead to turn them into great big stickers.

And then I adhered them to some scraps of pink cardstock I had in my stash and started punching.

I found that I liked the look a lot more when I punched just the edge of the doily so that part of the cardstock was still plain.

And then I stitched through the pieces on my sewing machine (hint, a slightly longer stitch length is your friend here).

Start by pulling out a length of thread (so you'll have something to hang your garland by). Lift the sewing machine foot and place your first piece right before where the needle will start, then lower the foot and sew the piece. After you've stitched it, lift the foot, pull out a short piece of thread (I pulled too much on mine, so you'll probably want to go shorter than what's pictured here), then place the next piece in and repeat the process. When you've finished stitching all your pieces, pull out another length of thread for the other end of your garland and cut the thread free from the machine.

Super simple, right?

I'm planning on making these for each season and also to use for decorations on wrapped packages. And I have a special Star Wars version in mind for some time soon.

Next week I'll be back to share another (very different) Valentine's garland...this time with glitter! Because glitter makes everything better, right?