twelve days of Christmas Crafts...DIY paper fan tutorial, made with vintage sheet music.

I bought a full box of vintage sheet music at a garage sale a while ago knowing that I could use it for all kinds of crafts. This DIY paper fan tutorial is the first of many projects.

This happens to be the second box of vintage sheet music I’ve had. The first box my SIL gave me shortly after we moved into our house, and I used it to cover my kitchen floor. We had awful green and black linoleum, so I glued down the sheet music to cover it up and sealed it with a boat load of polyurethane. It lasted a couple years and was ALWAYS a great conversation starter. For some reason people really marveled over it. I thought it was a cheap, fast cover up and was a bit embarrassed by it. Anyway…I’ve had these paper fans on my mind for a while now and finally got around to making them. So here’s what I did…

I stacked up a few sheets music and cut through the layers with my rotary cutter. I think I cut through about 4 sheets at a time to speed up the process.

I cut 3″ wide strips, but you can make them any size. (Just remember if you want big fans you’ll need to make your strips longer). I also cut off the ends because vintage sheet music is brittle and the ends tend to fray and tear.Then I accordian folded or fan folded the strips of sheet music, and glued together two strips to make one very long strip of folded paper. Fan folding is pretty simple but you want to try to get the creases the same size so when you glue on the center circle it’ll be flat. If you plan to make a ton of these fans then a scoring board would be very handy and speed up this process.

This is the point you want to add glitter. I glittered the edges in a random way.

Glue the ends of the paper strips together creating an accordion style tube of paper.

Then cut the circles for the center of the fans. These circles and the hot glue are what hold fans together. I traced my glue bottle and cut out the circles with scissors because I couldn’t find my big Martha Stewart circle punch.

Put a copious amount of hot glue in the center and stick your paper circle to the center. You need to do this on both sides of the fan.

Use the fans to decorate however your heart desires. I used mine to decorate my two Christmas trees by my fireplace. But I’ve used brightly colored fans in my foyer around a mirror for a birthday party. I used black and gold papers for fans on New Years Eve. The ideas are endless…fold, fold, fold!

These fans are so fun and festive for any occasion, I looooove them!

Check back tomorrow for my next Christmas craft. Tomorrow I’m making small lumbar Christmas pillows for my dining chairs.A quick video tutorial for additional help…