Reusable Fabric "Mylar" Party Balloons

How many times have you purchachase those iconic mylar balloon letters or numbers for a celebration? They're a staple at birthdays, graduations and New Years parties! But sometimes they don't inflate. Or they have a hole and they go flat. And they're a huge waste of money because you have to buy new ones all the time.

While I love being festive and decorating for parties, I hate adding party decor to the landfills. So I decided to make my own reusable "mylar" balloons! They'll never go flat, I can reuse them over and over (and over) again and they still give the same effect as the balloons you can buy at the party store. And you can make your own phrases too! With just a little fabric and some sewing skills, you can make your own mylar party balloons too!

You will need:

• Stretchy metallic fabric - I found this material at Joann's in the cosplay/fashion fabrics. It is mostly polyester with a little spandex and comes in different colors including silver.
• Invisible thread - I love invisible thread! While it is a lot harder to take photos of what you're stitching for documentation purposes, and it's not the most durable thread, I love it because it blends right into the fabric and helps "sell" that the edges of the letters are made of plastic.
• Needle
• Scissors
• Polyester fiber fill
• Printer and paper
• Pattern - I've attached a free A pattern for you to try out this project!

Helpful but not required:

• Pins and fabric clips
• A die cutting machine, such as a Cricut, to cut the fabric. I used a Cricut Maker.

The first thing I did was to create a pattern. My goal was to make my letters as close to the real thing as possible so I started by finding a photo of what I was looking to replicate. I brought the photo into my editing software (in this case, I used Silhouette Studio) to create patterns for each letter. Once I created each letter, I added a quarter inch offset to allow me to stitch along the border to give the crinkled edges.

If you don't have design software like Silhouette Studio (though it is free to download on Silhouette America's website), you could hand sketch a pattern or you can blow up the image you want to trace on your computer screen to the size you would like it, then put a piece of paper over the image and trace gently on your computer screen.

Once I had the patterns created in my software, I printed off the letters that I needed to spell out "Happy New Year." Since these letters aren't perfect, I made sure to print a front and a back for each letter by flipping the letter in the software and making a "back side" pattern. You could also just print one letter and then flip the pattern backwards when tracing and cutting the fabric (see step 2).

Once the pieces were printed, I cut them out with scissors.

Now that the patterns are ready, you can pin the paper patterns to the fabric and cut out the letters with a pair of good fabric scissors. Make sure to keep the pins within the offset on each letter. I noticed the pins left little pin holes and this area will best hide the holes created by the pins.

You'll want to make sure you create a "front" and a "back" for each letter. You can flip the design and print to make a front and back as I did, or you can just flip over your "front" pattern and then cut out the letter backwards to make the back.

Since I had the tools to do so, I utilized my Cricut Maker with a rotary blade to cut out the letters. This still took some time to set up, but cutting patterns has never been my favorite thing to do so using my Maker not only sped up the process, it gave me a really great result.

Now we are ready to start stitching the letters together. I don't think you can use a sewing machine to create this effect, especially with letters with interior bits like the inside of an A, so I hand stitched everything.

For starters, take a front and back of a letter, line them up and hold them in place. If you want to pin or use sewing clips to hold them together, it would definitely make the process easier. I have no patience for pinning and have no clips, so I just held the wrong sides together (the not shiny sides) and began sewing.

To create the iconic ruffly edge of the letters, I used what I can best describe as a backwards version of a blanket stitch. In a normal blanket stitch, you stitch from the outside of the shape to the inside of the shape with a solid line of thread along the border. Since I wanted to mimic the mylar balloons, I wanted a solid line just to the inside of the letter and the stitching going towards the edge of the fabric to create the ruffle.

Here's how to do a blanket stitch: https://www.instructables.com/Sewing-Blanket-Stitch-Coasters/

You can see an example in the second photo. On the left, there is an example of a normal blanket stitch, on the right is more so what I did for this project.

Sewing Tips:

-Double thread your needle. (Here's how.)

-As you stitch, pull the tread a little to create the ruffle before putting in the next stitch. This is when using clear thread really came in handy! Being a little messy with the stitching helps give variety to your ruffle, which is the look I preferred.

-Sometimes you may want to put in two stitches on top of each other to give the stitch more depth and lend some variety to your ruffle.

-If you have an interior hole in a letter, such as the middle of the A, P, R, etc., stitch that part first, then start on the outside of the letter.

-Start your stitching halfway up a side of a letter instead of starting at an edge. This will make it easier to stuff it later on.

-Be sure to leave at least a one inch hole on the side of the letter so you can add stuffing (see step 4).

Stuff the letters with polyester fiberfill. Use small clumps of the filling and use your finger (or a chopstick) to pack the filling into all the parts of the letters. Try to keep the filling from appearing lumpy by squeezing and rolling the parts that might be lumpy. Add enough fiberfill so the letters are a little squishy, but not too soft.

Once the letters are stuffed, sew your stuffing hole closed.

Some balloon letters have extra details to give dimension to the letter. For example, the R has an extra line from the middle down the edge. To add these details in, I did a straight and/or a backstitch through the letter, pulling tightly with each stitch. I started each of these extra details with a straight stitch but then did a little back stitching if the line wasn't appearing very strongly.

Now that all the letters are done, I decided to attach them to a ribbon for display. To attach the letters to the ribbon, I threaded the clear thread through the top of the letter and the middle of the ribbon and did a simple overhand knot to attach the ribbon to the letter. I tried best to equally space them too.

Since New Years is (thankfully) a ways off, I only put up "HAPPY" for now, but I am so thrilled with how this project turned out!

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Reflections: If I were to do this project again, I would add in little tabs on the top of the letters, just like mylar balloons. I believe this could be accomplished by cutting a strip of fabric and folding it over to create a tab. I would stitch these in as I was stitching the letters. This would allow you to string the letters up as you need them instead of sewing them directly to a ribbon for display. You'd have a lot more freedom to change out your saying this way as well, which I like the idea of.

I could see this project being really cute in a smaller or way larger size as well. One nice thing about making your own letters if you can make them whatever size you want. You could also change the font and create your own custom look too. I tried to copy the classic mylar balloons as much as possible, but like the idea of doing something custom as well.

I hope you enjoyed this project and will give it a try! It's a lot of fun and a great way to save money while keeping garbage out of the landfills.