Now, this was a winner idea!!
Before my daughter’s 1st birthday, I happened to be at a turning point in my life. I just resigned from the Marine Corps and I was moving from my home state of California to Northern Colorado. I had a month and a half before moving, and was able to spend it packing and planning for Cora’s party!
I decided to, duh duh DUH… make all my own decorations for her party. One of the things I thought of was a month-to-month garland of her first year. Why? Because I just thought she was the cutest thing ever (I still do), and I wanted to show her off to everyone! I also took all of her pictures, which I was proud of for an amateur. See how I did it here: Taking Professional Photos at Home!
Here’s what you need:
1) Any type of ribbon, cord, yarn, or even fishing line.
2) Photo-quality paper
3) Any color tulle (Michael’s, Joann’s, Hobby Lobby, Amazon, eBay, etc.)
4) Pictures of your sweetie (could be your son, daughter, husband, friend, etc.) I printed them out 2 on each page to create white space on either side of the picture so I could put holes in the white part to hang the pictures with. You don’t have to do this, though. You can poke holes in the picture itself. This is what it looked like on the paper:
5) Print-outs of the numbers I made here just for YOU:
Garland to print 1 2 3
Garland to print 0 4 5
Garland to print 6 7 8
Garland to print 9 12
Garland to print 10 11
Question Mark (because since it was her 1st birthday, we didn’t have pictures of her in her 12th month yet!)
DIRECTIONS:
1) Print out your pictures and numbers on photo quality paper.
2) Cut out your numbers and pictures with some white space left at the right and left of the top of the picture. Poke holes in the white part. Look at the “0” in this picture for an example.
3) Lace your ribbon (still connected to it’s source, since you don’t know how long you need it yet) through your numbers and pictures. Make sure the ribbon/cord is threaded behind your pictures.
4) Once everything is laced through, you can cut your ribbon from the source. Then, cut 1-in x 6-in strips of tulle and tie it around the ribbon between every picture and number. You can use one or more colors of tulle. I found that one was enough to spruce up my little creation, as seen below.
Easy, right?! After the party, we hung Cora’s garland up in her room in our new home. It is a great way to add some color and happiness to her space!
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