My husband and I are expecting our first baby this September. We are officially entering the third trimester this week and are starting to get the nursery set up and random items purchased (or gifted by grandparents). As first time parents, it can sometimes feel overwhelming when you see the amount of “things” a baby needs. A baby needs clothes, somewhere to sleep, a way to get from point a to b (strollers, carriers, car seats), diapers, etc. There are also a lot of items marketing toward parents they feel they need, but really don’t. Don’t get me wrong; I want the absolute best for my child. I plan to do everything in my power to give this child everything it needs in life. But I doubt wipes warmers existed 30 years ago, and I turned out just fine. So in the midst of it all, knowing we’d rather spend our money on the bigger, more important items like strollers and car seats, I’m sifting through the necessary vs. unnecessary and figuring out where we can save. One of those places: nursery decorations.

This project was dreamed up by Martha Stewart, not me. I like to think of myself as creative, but I won’t pretend I didn’t see adorable nurseries on Pinterest where other people did this craft. Regardless, I thought I’d share my finished product with you since this is so easy, budget friendly, and fun. Although I haven’t hung our nursery art on the walls yet (or put bedding on our crib- it’s currently out of stock) this will really tie our color scheme together for our gender-neutral nursery. It adds a playful, whimsical touch and visual interest. Some people even use these poms right above the crib as a baby mobile.

What supplies will you need for this DIY artwork? Tissue paper, fishing wire or a clear string to hang your poms, and some sort of hooks or tacks to secure them in the ceiling. You can see the color scheme we chose in the picture above: turquoise, orange, grey, and white. Grey tissue paper proved to be extremely difficult to find (who knew?) but I was determined. My parents got us this super soft baby blanket knitted by women in Haiti (below) and I chose our color scheme right then and there. Anyway… if you have luck like me and feel like stopping by Michael’s, JoAnne’s, Target, Rite Aid, Party City, Staples, Office Depot, or Papyrus looking for grey tissue paper… You’ll be disappointed. Believe it or not, I finally found some at Whole Foods while grocery shopping. Isn’t it funny how life works like that sometimes? Just when I’d given up and stopped looking, there it was!

So how do you make these things? For a full tutorial, head over here to Martha Stewart’s page. I do have a few tips I’d like to add since my first pom looked a bit pathetic. I followed her directions and only used eight sheets of paper to make a huge pom, and it looked a little drab. It needed more fullness, so I started over and found that using 16 sheets is much better to get the “fullness” I was looking for. To do this, just take your pack of tissue (usually they come in a pack of 8) and cut it in half. Stack them on top of each other and proceed as usual. Another tip: be very careful when pulling apart your layers. Tissue paper rips easily, and you don’t want to waste any of your supplies. And finally, play around with different sizes by scaling down your tissue paper. I love that our grey pom is much bigger than the others- it adds some interest and makes things less uniform. Well, it’s time to go clean up all the tiny paper shreds all over our floors. 🙂