HOW TO MAKE A BALLOON GARLAND
I have been wanting to make a balloon garland for the last year and finally found the perfect reason to give it a try....my son's 5th birthday! He has been so excited for his birthday and if you know me, I like to decorate for a good 2 weeks when it comes to birthdays, LOL! We started out with buying a premade tissue paper garland and number 5 balloon to decorate the living room and I decided to try and decorate the stairs with a balloon garland. With this being my first one, I had no idea how many balloons I would need and started off with 2 bags. The first bag was all lime green and the second bag was assorted colours and sizes.
I enlisted the help of my sister in law (she always seems to pop in when I'm decorating the stair case, LOL. Thanks Kym). Together we sorted out the colours and decided on a green, blue, white and yellow theme. We inflated them to different sizes to give the finished garland more dimension.
*NOTE - the finished garland is approximately 6 feet long and we used 40 balloons. The 10 lime green balloons were all inflated to the full size and the remaining 30 were left 1/2 size and 1/4 size.
For the next step you will need fishing line and a sewing needle. (I know a needle and balloon sounds like an accident waiting to happen) Thread the fishing line through the tied end of the balloon being careful to not pop the balloon. Through trial and error we would do one large green balloon, then 3 medium sized balloons and repeated the pattern. We left the 1/4 size balloons out until the end and stuffed them in the garland to fill in any bare spots. I have read that double sided tape or hot glue will work to keep the filler balloons in place.
For our first attempt we created a garland with the intentions of attaching it to the railing already completed. It came out a little short and was too strung to tight to find places to attach it to the railing. I cut the string and started over, this time stringing it in place to the railing. This method worked so much better and it is very secure since I was able to wrap the fishing line around the railing in several places.
*NOTE - Before you get too far along try to do a mock installation to the wall or table where you are going to be hanging it and see if you need to make any adjustments.
The garland has been up for a week and is the perfect decoration for an excited 5 year old! Now I just have to get busy and plan his party before it's time to take down the decorations, ha!
Happy Birthday G!
