DIY bead & straw garland

I want to show you how to make a fun and easy decorative garland to add interest to a needed space in your home using paper straws and beads. I’ve seen garlands made of paper, a simple strands of beads, funky yarn or ribbon, buttons and even candy! But I had so many paper straws and some wood beads and I needed to put to them good use. 

Garlands are really cool design elements. And they can be hung pretty much anywhere in your home such as shelves, chalkboards, bookcases, mantels – to add a bit of interest to a needed space.

I’ve had several decorative garlands in our home:

I draped a store bought yarn over our kitchen chalkboard.

I made a garland of pom poms and added it to my daughter’s pink-framed photo wall.

I used a beaded garland paired with a fun neutral yarn to hold my advent calendar – but I kept the garland up through the winter.

I have an open wood & wrought iron hutch in my entryway that needed a little extra something. A decorative garland was just the thing – and it was a great solution to use up those extra paper straws!

Here’s what you’ll need:

paper straws in coordinating colors – I used 3 different patterns
Xacto knife or scissors
fishing line or thin string
beads in desired colors – I used a variety of wood beads along with circular white shell beads that were on sale at Michaels!

Instructions:

1. Cut the straws in 1″ pieces with an Xacto knife or scissors.

2. Cut your fishing line to the desired length. I made 2 garlands, one 8 feet and one 9 feet.

3. Start threading the beads and straws in a pattern you like. I went with a random pattern but you can do a repeating one if you’d like for a more consistent look. One tip: begin and end the garland with a bead, versus a piece of straw, so that you can easily tie a knot in the ends – the straw is too wide for a regular knot.

4. Continue threading the beads until the end. Tie a knot and hang!

I had to add a few tack nails to my hutch to hold the garland but you can also just drape the garland over any corner of a piece of furniture, a picture, a shelf, or the edge of a door.

I think that garland is just what this piece needed! A super easy DIY you should definitely try.