Rainbow Yarn Hanging DIY

We are 3 MONTHS AWAY from meeting our baby girl—if you haven't seen our gender reveal, check it out! 

Her nursery is more than done, but I keep crafting and adding items to it daily (gonna run out of wall space). We still need some basic baby items like a car seat, bottles, diapers, and more clothes, but I have a few showers coming up and we will have it all ready by Oct/Nov, depending on when she wants to arrive! 

In the meantime, I've been caught up with the "latest trend" in crafting/design: RAINBOWS. I think this one will stay around a while because so many crafters are playing with colors, textures, and materials to create these rainbow wall hangings. 

You may have seen some of these on Instagram or Pinterest:

I think they're sooo cute, and you can customize any color scheme to fit your style. My nursery is more neutral/modern/eclectic boho (not really sure exactly), but I knew I wanted a rainbow wall hanging, not only because they're beautiful, but because this is our RAINBOW BABY. 

You most likely know what a "rainbow baby" is, but if you don't, it's your first baby after a loss or miscarriage. We were pregnant in April 2018 but miscarried around 6 weeks. It was very sudden and early, but we had gotten our hopes high so quickly about this new baby, it was a painful experience to work through. 

Now, rainbows are a sign of HOPE and HAPPINESS and good things to come. I still worry on occasion about this baby and her health/future, but I'm grateful that I'm able to carry a child at all and feel her small kicks each day. Our fertility journey was trying and humbling, and now I will never take a baby for granted. 

If you want to try this on your own, here's how! I did a "test" rainbow and then a second rainbow, using different materials on both to see which worked best.

RAINBOW NO. 1

Materials

Nylon Rope (92 cents a foot at Home Depot), 

you want your rope to be 12mm-15mm thick, about 5/8"

Embroidery Thread (Hobby Lobby, Walmart)

Floral wire (Hobby Lobby, Walmart), any bendable wire will work

Scissors (the stronger/sharper the better)

Scotch tape and Blue painter's tape

Hot glue gun + sticks

STEP 1: I got 6 feet of Nylon rope at Home Depot, it's shinier than cotton rope and more slippery, but it was cheaper too! I laid out my rainbow shape before cutting, and I taped off the bottoms of the rainbow with Scotch tape at first before using Blue painter's tape, which worked much better. 

STEP 2: Cut through the "loopy" areas so each strand of rope has its own end. You'll trim it exactly how you want at the very end, so right now it's just forming the rainbow and cutting the pieces. The tape prevents the rope from fraying or coming apart. 

STEP 3: Use the floral wire or bendable wire to shape the rainbow, taping every few inches along the way. This helps keep its form (it's not super crucial to do this step, but it adds extra security to the back of the rainbow). 

STEP 4: Wrap each individual rope with whatever color embroidery thread you like. This step was time-consuming and took me a couple of days to complete. Some people tie knots to keep the thread on, I just taped it where it stopped/started since I had to use multiple thread packages. 

The wrapping is a little tricky—you have to hold all the thread in one hand and the rope in the other and then finagle your way around it. Some people have perfect rainbows where the thread is in a straight line, but mine turned out a little more messy/natural looking. I didn't want to spend hours making sure each thread lined up with the next. 

I covered the blue tape (keep the tape on the whole time, it never comes off) and taped off the embroidery thread. These were colors I already had on hand, since it was my practice rainbow I didn't worry too much. 

STEP 5: Lay out your rainbow with its messy ends on a table and form it how you want it to look, with the ends lined up and everything close together. 

Use a hot glue gun to keep the pieces together. I held all 5 ropes pretty tight against each other so there'd be no gaps, then I just ran the glue gun in random patterns, going straight across all 5 ropes and then in between each rope. 

This is what it looks like with the hot glue on the back: 

STEP 6: Cut the ends of the rope to your desired length and fray it out however you want. Some rainbows have long tails, others are short or staggered. 

STEP 7: Hot glue a ribbon/rope to the back center and hang where you want! 

Overall, this was easier than I imagined! The embroidery thread was hard to work with, so my next rainbow uses yarn. 

RAINBOW NO. 2

Materials

Cotton Rope (bought on Amazon), 

you want your rope to be 12mm-15mm thick, about 5/8"

Colored Yarn (Hobby Lobby, Walmart)

Floral wire (Hobby Lobby, Walmart), any bendable wire will work

Scissors (the stronger/sharper the better)

Scotch tape and Blue painter's tape

Hot glue gun + sticks

Same steps as above! This time, instead of taping off the thread/yarn, I tied a knot on one end of the rope and then started wrapping, and that helped a TON! 

I LOVE how these turned out! On Etsy, they go for $40-100ish, and I made these together for about $35! Plus, it was fun to get creative and make something for our baby. 

Tips: 

1. Use YARN: Embroidery thread is beautiful and if you have a lot already, go for it! But using yarn on the second rainbow was soooo much easier. I tied a knot on the rope and was able to wrap the whole length of the rope without stopping to get more yarn. 

2. Nylon and Cotton both work fine: After using both kinds of rope, I'd probably use cotton if I were to make another one, but Nylon was a few dollars cheaper and honestly worked fine! The difference is in the sheen on the frayed ends—Nylon is whiter/brighter and shiny, while cotton is more natural looking. They were both equally easy to wrap/work with. 

3. Play with colors and sizing: I wish I would've gotten more rope in different thicknesses so I could make mini ones, keychains, etc. I made two medium-to-large rainbows and love them! I'd love to make some mini ones, but I don't need 50 rainbows all around my room. 

4. No wrong way: Instead of threading the back to keep it all together, I used hot glue, which some crafters would frown upon. But whatever you have on-hand and whatever you feel like doing, do it! If you want to wrap multiple colors on one rope, go for it! If you want to make a striped one, or try velcro instead, or play with materials, just have fun!