Tissue Paper Poms Tutorial

Hiya friends,

Today I am excited to show you the table signs I've been working on because I think they're FAB-ULOUS!

I am equally excited about linking up with 4th Grade Folics for my first ever Monday Made-it!

Soooo...I was inspired by several blogs and Pinterest to create these tissue paper poms to hang from the ceiling in my classroom. I took it a step further and added the table number sign and a cutie patootie owl. Here's the finished product:

I love them all!!!! But, if I had to choose a favorite...maybe the green one...or the yellow. I can't choose. Obviously, these are not hanging in my classroom yet. I can't even get in the building until August 13th! AHHHHHH!!! Ahhhhhhh! Okay, moving on. They are hanging in my house. And, they will stay hanging there until August 13th. My husband hates that I poked holes in the ceiling to hang them, but it's just teeny tiny little push pin holes. Sorry, babe. I have a teenage son who is six feet, two inches tall. He has to dodge them when he walks down the hall. Sorry, Jerm.

There are LOTS of tutorials online on making tissue paper poms, but here's how I did it:

I started by choosing tissue paper that I thought coordinated with the table sign and the owl. I used 6 sheets of the 19 3/4 IN/PO X 2 1/6 FT sheets. But the tissue is a little too long, so I had to trim it once it was folded up. I'll show you that in a minute. Other than tissue paper, you will need a ruler, fishing line, jewelry wire, scissors, button, hot glue gun, ribbon, and a sewing needle.

For this pom, I placed three orange sheets on top of three yellow sheets of tissue paper, but you can alternate the colors depending on the desired look. Then, I folded the paper accordian style smoothing out the edges with a ruler along each fold.

Once I had the paper folded, I wrapped a few inches of jewelry wire at the center of the bundle of paper. Next, I trimmed about an inch and a half from both ends. On my first attempt, without trimming, the pom was large enough to hang from the ceiling of a concert hall :-( You could just buy smaller paper though :-) After I cut off some length, I rounded the edges so it would look more like petals on a flower. In the last pic, I'm preparing to seperate the tissue paper on one half on my pom.

I pulled a piece of tissue to the right, then a piece to the left, alternating side-to-side. It's not pretty at first (the bottom left pic).  Once all the pieces were roughly pulled apart I shaped it to look like a blossom. I intentionally made mine flat on one side because I planned on nesting an owl on it, but you can make it more spherical if you want.

Next, I hot glued a piece of ribbon to the pom and then to a table sign. The signs pictured are from Cara Carrol's Chalk One Up for Being Organized pack. I like them, but I can't decide if they are too dark for these poms and should be replaced with something that has a white background. What do you think? Ok, back to the ribbon. After I glued the ribbon to the table sign, I glued a decorative button over the end of the ribbon to make it look more finished. Finally, I threaded a needle with fishing line. I "sewed" the fishing line through the wire at the center of the pom and through the top and bottom of the owl leaving enough line to hang the pom from the ceiling. Obviously, I'll have to adjust the length of the fishing line once I get into my classroom.

My husband's favorite is the green pom. What's yours?