Hair Bow Organization

To go along with our H is for Hair quiet book page, today I have a quick organizational project to share with you! My girls (like most little girls, I expect) have a fairly large number of hair accessories. They have a few headbands, a large handful of elastics, but what really started accumulating were barrettes, clips, and bows. They are all super cute, but without a good way to organize them they ended up jumbled in a battered ziplock bag, and we rarely went to the trouble of rummaging through the clutter to pick out the right accessories.

One day after Christmas I was organizing and cleaning in the girls' room, putting away their new hair bows from Christmas, and decided it was time to do something. Taking a cue from the ribbon organization in our quiet book page, I decided to frame vertical stripes of ribbon on which I could clip the hair bows. That way they would all be visible, and the color would add some fun girliness to the room. A quick search on Pinterest showed that my idea was far from unique, but I did independently come up with it. If so many people came up with the same idea, it probably has some merit!

First I bought a $2 frame from Goodwill, removed the glass and the faded print inside, and spray painted the frame white. Actually, Collin spray painted it for me one afternoon, since he could take it to a place with better ventilation. Painting in the winter is the only time I really wish we had a garage.

Then I covered the matting and cardboard back with a natural-colored fabric, similar to burlap but with a finer-weave. I just smoothed the fabric over the board and fixed it with packing tape. So, so easy. Then I cut five pieces of white grosgrain ribbon , spaced them evenly, taped them to the back and added a couple of staples to the edges to make it extra secure. I had to discipline myself to make such a neutral colored project, remembering that the color of the hair bows was the focal point, not the pretty fabric, ribbon, or frame.

Then we nailed the ribbon board back into the frame, clipped on all the hair bows, and it was finished! This was seriously one of the fastest projects I've done in a long time. It took probably about two and a half hours, including painting and hanging up - although that doesn't count the time the frame took drying overnight. Still, nearly instant-gratification for a DIY project - and so pretty and useful!