Craft: Easy bows

One of the easiest things to decorate with are bows.  They’re easy and quick to make.

You’ll need approx 3 yds. or more of wide wired ribbon.

I tied one for my front door decoration and took pictures to illustrate.  You’ll use one hand to hold the bow (I use my less dominant left hand) and one hand to make the loops and twist the ribbon.  To finish the bow, you will need either florists wire or a long twist tie.

First, make a loop at one end of the ribbon:

Then, while holding the center loop together in one hand, take the long part of the ribbon, twist it a complete twist (so that the outside of the ribbon is facing outwards again), and make a second larger loop to one side of you center loop:

These pictures are of the back or underside of the bow…

Now, repeat that on the other side of your center loop:

You will keep making increasingly larger loops on either side of your first center loop until you are satisfied with the size of your bow, or you are at the end of the ribbon (remember to hold all the loops tightly together in your one hand):

When you are finished, you can leave the last bit of ribbon hanging down (and tie on another lenghth) to make it look like it has “ends”, or you can tie the last bit of ribbon into the bow so there are no “ends”.   I chose to make the last of my ribbon into one last loop.  Here I am putting in the twist tie to secure the bow.  You can see the very end of the ribbon just to the right (in the pic) of my thumb:

You’ll string your wire through the original center loop and around all subsequent loops of your bow – basically where you’ve been holding it together.  The tie keeps the loops together.  Be sure to secure it as tightly as possible:

Once you’ve tied the bow and secured it tightly with the wire, you can “arrange” the loops to your liking.  You can twist them, tug them up or down – just play around with it until you like how it looks!

Now you can tie your bow onto anything using the bits of wire behind it.  If you’re tying onto your Christmas tree, you’ll need a longer wire than if you’re just tying it onto something small like I did with my star.   I just tied it onto the loop at the top of my star that you use to hang it:

And, voila:

*(Both the ribbon and the star are from Pier 1 Imports)