Please welcome our next guest blogger, Jennifer Harrison! She was the winner of our "For The Love Of Ribbon" Valentine's Challenge, with her adorable Valentine's pillow. Take the time to visit Jennifer at her blog, www.hopefulhomemaker.com, where she shares her adventures in creativity as well as raising 8 young children. We had so much fun working with Jennifer and hope you enjoy her post as much as we did:
Ribbon Party!
Most of us would love to throw a lovely party: baby shower, birthday, holiday, luncheon, or just a nice dinner. The hard part is figuring out how to pull it all together attractively in a reasonable amount of time and for little money.
Whenever I want to take my home from everyday to special, I turn to ribbon. I've found it's a great way to create a festive atmosphere at the last minute, and very inexpensively. For this post, I thought I'd spotlight just a few ways you can use a bit of ribbon to dress up some ordinary things that we all have on hand.
The first thing I do is choose a color scheme. This is often dictated by the event I'm planning for. Then I get several yards of ribbon that coordinate with one another and with the mood I'm seeking. For this little luncheon, I chose ribbons that were white, turquoise and aqua.
For my centerpiece I decided to use candles. I wandered around my house and collected all the white candles I had, then taped a strip of ribbon around each one. Arranged on a platter, they look lovely. You could also do this with jars, and fill them with fresh flowers or candy.
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I found a piece of white fabric to use as a table runner. I cut two lengths of ribbon to place along the edges of the fabric. I didn't even sew it on, just laid the ribbon out and used a few pieces of double sided tape to hold it together.
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I then set the table, and used pieces of ribbon sewn into a circle as my napkin holders. This is a great idea especially for larger gatherings. You can make napkin rings that match the event for large groups of people, and storing them takes almost no room! This would work well for holiday dinners. I simply used paper napkins and plain white plates. For a large group I would even use paper plates for easy clean up.
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I used more ribbon to embellish a small favor box with a little gift for my guests.
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Now the table looks party-ready, and ribbon is the key ingredient!
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To make the atmosphere even more festive, try making a ribbon garland. I will show you two different options, both simple and fast, that create two different but pretty looks.
For the first garland, I decided to make 7 flags that were 10 inches long and 7 inches wide at the top. I cut a piece of fabric that was 10 inches wide and 28 inches long. Then I simply sewed ribbons onto the fabric.
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After attaching the ribbon, I carefully cut my fabric into triangles.
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I turned the triangles right side up and had 7 flags in alternating patterns.
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I then cut a long length of ribbon and folded it in half (I ironed mine). I placed the flags inside at evenly spaced intervals and pinned them in place. I then sewed along the entire length of the ribbon.
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Done!
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Just for fun, here's another kind of garland that can literally be put together in less than 5 minutes. I chose three ribbons: white, aqua, and turquoise. For this garland, I used the new faux linen ribbon that May Arts just came out with, and I cannot say enough about how wonderful it is! I think it's my new favorite, and wish I had some in every color.
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For my garland, I put the white ribbon on top, then the aqua, and then the turquoise. I made the aqua piece a couple of feet longer than the white, and the turquoise a couple of feet longer than the aqua. I found the center of each piece and attached all three together at this point. You can do this with a glue gun, a couple of stitches, or even some well-concealed paper clips. Then I took the ends of the ribbon and lined them up evenly with one another, and attached all three lengths again about 18 inches from the ends of the ribbon. Do this on both ends. You're done! Now hang your lovely 5 minute garland for all to see.
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I found that this garland was very elegant looking.
So there it is. Picture perfect, and all it took was ribbon!
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Next time you want to throw a party, don't hesitate. Instead of thinking about what you DON'T have, walk around and take stock of what you DO have. Dress it up with some pretty ribbon, and you've got it made. There's no limit to the ways you can make your party festive if you've got ribbon!
Thank you, May Arts, for the lovely ribbon you manufacture, and for this opportunity to share my ideas with your readers!
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Blog Posted By: Jennifer Harrison
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