Discovering 2014: Paper Bows

Discovering 2014 is a personal goal to complete a daily project every day throughout the year!

My day three project was Paper Bows. This was a much shorter project, only taking about 10-15 minutes for my first try. It's pretty simple and I see it as a nice way to add a personalized touch to a present. This could also be a nice craft to do with your kids!

The directions to create the bow are easy to follow.

I ended up printing out the template pictured above, which was generated from this pin by ThriftyJinxy over on Pinterest. Since the paper I was using started as a 12x12 I couldn't run the paper itself through the printer, so just cut out the shapes, traced them onto the back of my scrapbook paper and then cut those out.

Once you have your cut-outs you take the bikini-looking shape and gently curve each oval until the two side tabs touch in the center back. Glue the tabs together (I used Mod Podge but regular glue would work too), but don't worry about gluing them to the center back (the little wrap-around one ends up holding it in place). Then glue the center of the no-longer-bikini-shaped piece to the center of the wing-shaped piece. Now take the tiny tab piece, wrap it around the center of all of that, and glue it on the backside. The result should look like this:

That's it! Let the glue finish drying and you have a paper bow. I used scrapbook paper, which will hold its shape well as long as it isn't outright crushed, but I imagine any paper would work fine for this. The finished product is about the length of my index finger.

Tomorrow's project is Paint Chip Jewelry!