Custom Wedding Garland . How To-sday

Today I have a fun and easy tutorial. That’s right – How To-sday is on an actual Tuesday for once! On this particular Tuesday, we’re going to learn how to make a custom wedding garland, though this would be perfect for any occasion, really! Silhouette is having a sale on their Designer Edition software now through July 10, so they gave it to me to try out. Though I received free software and supplies, all opinions are entirely my own, of course.

Andrei and I are putting together a DIY photo booth for our wedding next month (Ahhh – did I really just say next month?!), so we made a little homemade photo booth style picture to enclose with our invitations. I made a little banner to use in the photos, and I’m probably going to make lots more for the big day. P.S. I promise he really does like me. Apparently he just felt that this should be a very surrious photo…

Read on for the full tutorial!

1.   Open Silhouette Studio Designer Edition. Type your letters onto a 12×12 page. Choose a font – anything you have on your computer. I like BEBAS for letter garlands because it’s bold and easy to read, but you could do a fun script or stencil font instead.

2.   When you have all your letters typed and sized up as large as you want, use the ellipse tool to make a .25 inch hole. Hold down the shift key while making it to create a perfect circle. Next, go to the Object menu, and replicate a row of four as many times as you need. This keeps them in a straight line.

3.   Arrange your little circles at the tops of each letter. This will give you holes to thread your string through. I recommend using Silhouette chipboard for the letters so that they’ll be really sturdy. You could use a fun printed cardstock instead, but I wouldn’t go with anything lighter-weight than that. Go ahead and cut the letters out when you’ve adjusted your settings for your paper weight.

4.   Thread a piece of yarn or fishing line through the letters. When you have them all strung, space them out however you like, and use a tiny piece of tape on the back of each letter to keep them from sliding around on the string too much.