The Final Countdown...

A few days late, but I have a little New Year's Eve update. I helped decorate for the house party I attended and we wanted to do a few simple things that would make the place look fun and festive without looking tacky - always a risk on NYE. It should come as no surprise to anyone who can read the title of this blog that I was alllll for a little glitz and glimmer. Along with a few store bought decorations (NYE banner, gold glitter garland, etc.), here are the 3 projects I worked on:

(1) Paper Chain
You know you made these as kids. Seriously the easiest project ever. We picked up a package of glitter 5x7 cardstock from the scrapbook section at Michael's. I cut each page into 3 strips, and stapled them in loops together, like so:

We had enough to wrap the whole main bannister and I think it looked pretty cute! I did this project while watching TV and it took maybe 45 minutes.

(2) Gold Tissue Fringe
This project was inspired by the amazing party decorations Natalie over at mintlovesocialclub always creates. I used her tutorial for inspiration, but made a few alterations to suit our purposes. I bought a package of gold tissue paper from Dollarama - there were 8 sheets in the pack. I folded the squares in half, so it looked like a 5x1 grid. I then cut the folder part in half,  cut off the last little square, and then cut the remaining 4 squares in half, like so:

Original sheet

Folded in half

Cut in half

Cut into sections of 2, once the end square was removed

So each original sheet made two large banner sections. Then, I folded the two square piece in half along the existing crease, cut an angle from the centre to 2-3 inches below the side, and cut some fringe:

Folded in half

Cut on angle

Cut fringe

Then, I just unfolded the tissue paper and had a cute little banner section like this:

I did this a whole bunch of times and then attached them together with a little tape on the inside. You could also do it with ribbon, like Natalie did here, but I didn't have anything on hand that would work, so I just stuck them together.

You waste a LOT of tissue doing this though, and I felt really bad - so I decided to use the leftovers to make another banner but this one half-sized. I basically just took one square instead of two and followed the same procedure.

The whole process was very simple. The larger ones took about 30 seconds each once I had the hang of it (after doing 2 or 3) and the smaller ones took 15-20 seconds each. The most time consuming portion was taping them together, and that still only took 20-30 minutes.

We ended up using the smaller banner on the brick fireplace - unfortunately, I didn't get a picture before it started to fall down! The tape we used wouldn't stick to bricks. We ended up just leaving the lower section up, as that was the only part that would stick. The tissue paper is super fragile, so I just ripped off the section that wouldn't stay up. (Because it's super fragile, you also have to be careful you don't rip the tissue when you're making or transporting the banner.)

After the top section had already fallen down...

The larger banner was used as part of project #3:

(3) Photobooth!
Everyone loves a photobooth, so we figured we'd throw one together in a small room off of the living room. We hung 2 sheets of kraft paper on the wall, hung the larger gold tissue fringe banner across the top, and then added a glitzy 2013 that I had made out of gold glitter and plain black cardstock from Michael's.

2013 cut out of gold glitter cardstock

Glued onto black cardstock

Glue used

Finished product!

I also cut out a bunch of little gold stars from the gold glitter remnants, which we stuck to the banner and used in the middle of the dining table (along with some cheap gold balls) as a makeshift centerpiece.

The extra neat thing about this project was that people were able to email photobooth photos they took with their phone to an email address and the photos would be redirected to a slideshow on the TV! It was super fun and people seemed to love it... judging by how many photos that made it into the slideshow. The boy is SUPER tech savvy ;)

Photobooth in action, complete with dollar store props

Another little project I did - although not decor-related - was making Champagne Jello Shots with PopRocks! Among my group of friends, jello shots are ubiquitous - but these ones are slightly (SLIGHTLY) classier. For those of you who don't have the recipe memorized, haha - jello shots are made by replacing the cold water in the jello recipe with alcohol. My friend, J., is the jello shot queen - she even matches the alcohol to the flavour of jello! Most of us are not so skilled, however, and just use vodka. For these particular jello shots, you replace the cold water with champagne, rather than vodka - making them extra festive! (and a little bit bubbly!). Then, just before you serve them, sprinkle some PopRocks on each shot! Definitely don't do this in advance though - the PopRocks will start to pop as soon as they hit the jello and will dissolve after a little bit. They were definitely a hit - everyone loves a good nostalgic PopRocks explosion!

So those are the few little party DIYs I did! Super easy, super quick, and super /delicious - my favourite trifecta! I'll definitely be breaking out some of these ideas for parties in the future.

Hope you're enjoying 2013 so far!