Valentine's Day Heart Garland

Happy Monday!

Who's excited about the holiday that's coming up in a couple of weeks? And no, I'm not talking about President's Day, although that one does equal a day off of work... I'm talking about Valentine's day! 

This infamous holiday is typically one that people either love to hate, or embrace whole-heartedly (double pun intended) for its excellent excuse to be oh-so romantic. Personally, I do like the excuse to be romantic, but I'm not a huge fan of the pressure that comes with it. 

I also love conversation hearts - but that's a story for another day.

Today, I'm embracing the holiday and bringing you a fun, easy Valentine's Day craft. As you saw in the title, it's a heart garland. Made of paper. I "upcycled" some old magazine pages, along with some plain white printer paper, to make some three-dimensional hearts. Then I strung 'em up on some baker's twine and called it done.

Here are the details if you'd like to make one yourself:

Supplies needed:

• Predominantly white and/or red magazine pages (what you use is really up to you though!)
• White printer paper
• Scissors
• Double stick tape
• Baker's twine or string

Here are a few of the magazine pages I used:

Take three similarly colored pages (I'm using three white ones to demonstrate here), stack them on top of each other, and fold the pile in half length-wise. Make sure the part you want to face out on the finished heart is on the inside of the fold. You can see the white, furry hat from the image above is on the inside of the fold below because I want to be able to see that on the finished heart.

Cut out a half-heart on the side of the paper with the fold. I freehanded mine, but you can draw an outline first if you're more comfortable with that. By cutting three at the same time, you'll have three of the exact same, symmetrical hearts.

Continue this process for as many hearts as you want. Vary the sizes for a more interesting final product. I ended up with nine sets of three hearts in total.

Take one set of three hearts and lay them out side by side, keeping each folded in half. Put one piece of double stick tape near the edge of each heart.

Stick "matching" sides to one another in a circular fashion so that you eventually end up with a three-dimensional heart shape. Now you can see that what was on the inside of the fold is now facing out.

Once you've made your hearts, thread a needle with your baker's twine (or string), and "sew" your hearts together. If you look closely at the photo below, you can see that I "sewed" my twine through one side of each heart. I didn't take a detailed photo of this process because I figure it's pretty self-explanatory :).

There's no right way to do it. Just experiment and see what you think looks best!

One you've strung all your hearts together, your garland will look a little something like this:

Try to ignore the creepy baby eye on one of the hearts...that wasn't intentional...

I love how they look a little different from each side with different parts of the magazine pages showing.

Now you've got a fun little heart garland for Valentine's Day! It's not over the top - just a little touch to remind you of that special little day in February ;). And since it's probably made of materials you already have around, it's practically free. Love that. This one could be fun to do with kids too, since they probably know how to cut out paper hearts like pros (as long as they can wield scissors safely). I feel like that's an elementary school requirement?

So tell me, have you done any Valentine's Day crafts yet? Or are you avoiding them all together in protest of this day? ;)

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