It’s that time of year again. You know, when you have to prep your children over and over that the things they are about to see are not real! We’ve had more talks about bones, witches and monsters than I can count. I’m happy to say my prep talks have worked for the most part and my girls are pretty pumped for Halloween this year. I made this super easy shredded paper ghost garland the other day to surprise them with. I’m thinking we’ll hang it outside as we get a little closer to Halloween. It’s been floating around my mind for months and I’m psyched to show you how to make it because it’s so easy.
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For starters, you need some paper. I’ve made the ghosts here with regular printing paper, as well as fiber tissue paper, which is a stronger version of tissue paper. If you can’t get your hands on some fiber tissue paper, I’m sure regular tissue paper
would work just as well. Whichever paper you use, here’s the step by step tutorial.
1. Cut up a stack of 8.5×11 paper the vertical way into skinny strips. You’ll need about 20 of them for each ghost.
2. Put the strips in a spread out pile that fits in your hand. You may want to spread out the strips a little, with a few going diagonal.
3. Fold the strips in half leaving a little puff at the top for the head.
4. Take two strips and tie them around the strips forming the head. Sometimes the strips break off a little. No big deal. These aren’t meant to look perfect. You can also try again until you get it just right. I cut a few straggles that didn’t look quite right.
5. Glue some black sequins or googley eyes
on for the eyes. Your ghost is complete.
6. Make as many as you want and string them on fishing wire for a garland. The fishing wire should go easily through the strips of paper where the head is. If you put the garland at more of a u shape than a straight line you might need to put a little scotch tape on the ghosts so that they don’t slide into each other.
The ones above are from regular strips of printing paper. The ones below are from fiber tissue.
Aren’t they fun? If you like this post, you might like slimy pumpkin play, or this cool idea. Thanks for reading along and have fun!
I am in love with this project!! So creative and such a cute Halloween decoration too! Will be doing this tomorrow with some of my kids in occupational therapy – thanks for the idea! 🙂
Oh great! Let me know how it goes! If the paper breaks off when you tie the knot for the head, you can also put a little glue to hold it. Have fun!