La Vita DiBella: Blogger Pattern Challenge: DIY Fabric Garland Window Treatment

Hello everyone! Today I am participating in a Blogger Challenge to use Pattern in a project! If you are visiting La Vita DiBella for the first time, welcome! Chelsea from Pinterior Designer challenged myself and 7 other bloggers to come up with a project using pattern. Following the post you can check out everyone's great patterned projects by clicking on the links provided!

I have to admit, I'm not the best at using pattern. I usually gravitate towards soft and neutral colors and honestly have a phobia when it comes to mixing patterns. It's something I really need to learn to do better, so this challenge couldn't have come at a better time!

Since my husband Frank and I have been busy preparing for the upcoming birth of our son (in less than 5 weeks!), we have been doing lots of projects in the nursery. The theme is elephants and the nursery colors are grey, tan, white and mint. In order to carry the color theme throughout the room I made these Yarn Wrapped Letters and a DIY Elephant Mobile.

We looked at purchasing window treatments for the nursery and decided we did not want to spend the money on them since we will likely only have them for a few years before our son will want something a bit more grown up. So, instead, I created a very easy Fabric Garland to add some interest to the windows.

The whole project took me a total of 2.5 hours. If you don't have some of the quilting supplies on hand it will probably take a bit longer to cut all the strips of fabric, but luckily my mom is a quilter and helped me with her quilting tools to make the cutting process super quick and easy.

I used some fabric that my mom had left over and purchased a few 1/4 yard cuts of patterned fabric in the colors I wanted. I tried to mix and match patterns that were the same color. The patterns make the fabric interesting and I learned that mixing patterns is not an issue when you combine the correct colors!

First, my mom and I used the rotary and rotary cutting board to cut 1" strips of fabric from each 1/4 yard piece. I used 2 1/4 yard pieces per color.

Once the strips were cut, I lined up the strips by color. For my garlands I grouped together 6 strips of fabric in like colors and alternated colors.

Then, all you have to do is tie knots with the fabric strips along whatever type of yarn or rope you choose. For my garland I used twine since it matched the tan in my color scheme and since it is strong, but you can use any type of strong yarn or rope.

Don't you love how the different patterns all look great together? I think I may have overcome my fear of mixing patterns! ...maybe.

Then, all I did was have my husband Frank hang the garlands from the windows in the nursery and voila! Super fast, super cute and laid back window treatments! You could also use the garland to decorate the crib, drape below a shelf or above a bookcase.

Here's a peek of the rest of the nursery with the mobile hanging above the crib. We still have some more decorating and organizing to do, but we are getting closer to having things finished every day.

Thanks for stopping by La Vita DiBella today! If you're visiting, I'd love for you to stick around to browse the site and hope you'll come back to visit sometime soon!

I'd love to know: What creative ways have you used pattern?

And, don't forget to check out the creative ways these lovely bloggers have used pattern in their projects: