Day 6: Christmas Pom Pom Garland

Hello there! It’s Christine here and I am excited to be joining in on Power Poppy's December Power & Spark Challenge with our Twelve Days of Christmas twist! As visions of sugar plums dance in your heads, is the paper still flying in your crafting spaces? If you love to put a colorful and personal spin on your holiday creations, we love to hear it and we’re here to help! For the next week and a half, get ready for Power Poppy’s festive and fun take on the 12 Days of Christmas – a time to get inspiration to deliver that homespun charm not only to your loved ones but around your home as well. Each day our designers will be sharing ideas on all kinds of projects from home décor to accents for your holiday dinner table to ideas on how to package up those holiday goodies with style!

And guess what? If you play along with us during any one of the 12 days and try our project at hand, link up your creation right here and you’ll be in the running for our Power & Spark 12 Days of Christmas Challenge winnings! That’s right – you’ll have 12 ways to enter. Play along once or try all 12 days for more chances to win a....

 $50 shopping spree to the Power Poppy Shop!

Here on DAY SIX, I’ve chosen to create a garland for Christmas to decorate a mantle. As I was dreaming up some ideas I decided to make my garland a little whimsical and add some homemade pom poms to the garland as accents, which I’ll also show you how to create.

To start with I used Marcy’s gorgeous new set, Winter Wonderland. After stamping it on XPress It Blending Cardstock (twice), then colouring it with Copics, I trimmed out one of the designs and then cut out some of the coloured pieces from the second stamped image, popping them up overtop of the original spray for dimension. I set that aside and started working on my letters.

Using my Silhouette die cutting machine, I cut out three large white letters spelling JOY. You don’t even need a special file to do this, just the alphabet/letter function on the Silhouette. It’s great because you can spell out any word you like in a variety of fonts. Each of the letters I cut is about 7"wide x 8 1/2” tall. I used heavier coverstock weight cardstock for sturdiness. Then I stamped the Winter Wonderland stamp on to the J and the Y in SU Rich Razzleberry ink.

Next, I took a Tim Holtz Stencil (Flourish), some embossing paste and glitter and added some pretty sparkly dimension to the letters, giving it some time to dry. Funny story, in all my years of creating I’ve never spilled too much glitter, but on this project I accidently dumped a whole container of glitter everywhere. Let’s just say, “sparkle for days."

I gave each letter a border of Rich Razzleberry paper to give them even more stability.

For the O, after adding the sparkly dimension, I placed the spray of flowers on the left-hand side of the letter attaching using foam dots.  

These next photos give you a bit of of better look a the colouring and the dimension in the spray.  

As beautiful as the stamp looks coloured, it’s equally as lovely stamped in a single colour because of how detailed it is.  I also think it helps the garland from becoming too fussy by only adding one coloured up image.  

I thought I’d show you how I threaded the ribbon, or yarn in this case, through the back of each letter. I cut a little rectangle of paper 2” x 3 “ and scored each side twice along the narrow way to create a popped up channel for the ribbon to go through. This works well if you don’t want to put holes into your letters to form the banner. I adhered them with Scor Tape so they’ll really stay put.

Now I’ll show you how to create the pom poms. Maybe you remember creating them when you were little? All you need to start with is some sturdy cardboard. I just cut up a Kraft Dinner box and folded it over in the middle and glued it together. You could also use a heavier cardboard box and it would hold up even better. You want it to be able to withstand the tension of the yarn wrapped around it.

The size of your cardboard determines the size of your finished pom poms.  This cardboard is about 2 3/4” by 3 1/2”.  Cut a small slit in the middle of the cardboard.  This is where you’ll tie your pom pom together in the centre.  

Wrap your yarn around the cardboard. You can use any type of yarn, of any width or weight.  The weight you use will influence how fluffy it gets, but it’s fun to experiment with different kinds of yarn.  For these pom poms, I’ve wrapped a chunky type of yarn about 12 rows wide about in 3 - 4 different passes or layers.  You want it to be quite puffy so that you have a nice full pom pom.  

Next cut a length of yarn about a foot long.  Scooch your yarn together toward the center of the cardboard from each side, so you can see the slit you’ve cut, on both sides of the bundle of yarn.  Tuck one end of your cut length through each side of the bundle in the slit, and cinch the bundle together in the middle by pulling your cut ends of the foot of ribbon tight.  

Cinch it as tight as you can together and tie a tight knot in the middle.  How tight you tie it will help create the puffiness of your pom pom.  

I also slip the ends you just tied through the slit in the cardboard to the opposite side, then cinch that up as tight as I can and tie it again to really keep the center firm.

Next, take a sharp scissor and cut open the bundle of yarn at each side of the cardboard to make your puffy pom pom.  Slip that off the cardboard form.  

Now its time for your pom pom to get a hair cut!  If you trim the ends it will have a more round uniform ball look.  

So cute!  Repeat till you have as many pom poms as you’d like.  It’s actually really quick to do and kids will enjoy doing it as well.  My pom poms are about 3 1/2 inches diameter finished.  

All you need to do to form the garland is take a long length of yarn (about 5 - 6 feet depending on how long you want your garland, take a needle with a wide eye and thread the yarn or ribbon through the center of the pom poms and letters alternately and you’re done!  

Now, if you create a Christmas themed garland, be sure to link up your creation HERE and show us so that you can enter our 12 Days of Christmas Power & Spark Challenge. There are so many ways to play this month -- 12 in fact -- so let's spread a little cheer and share some homemade charm! 

Wishing each of you great JOY this season!  

Christine