These bows look so elegant and expensive, but they;re actually made from paper strips!  While you could use any kind of paper you like to cut your strips, we used embossed striped paper from wallpaper samples.  Go to most any paint or home improvement store and you'll find that they're usually thrilled to give away old sample books of wallpaper.  That's right, give them away, as in for free, gratis, nada.  This represents an incredible find for creative crafters -- free supplies!   The sample books provide wonderful papers for all kinds of craft projects, and once you start flipping through the pages, you'll come up with all kinds of uses for the various designs.

For these bows, we went to sample books of elegant papers in a striped design.  Wallpaper sample books are usually filled with this popular style, and often the striped papers are conveniently in gold, silver, or other metallics, or even in satin finished that really look like ribbon when cut.

The results are stunning, and once the paper strips are cut, this project is easy enough for kids to do.

Start by cutting a bunch of paper strips (see note above for suggestions).  The bow on the right in the photo at right uses varying widths of strips, while the bow on the left uses strips of all the same width.

Now turn each strip into a figure 8 loop.  To do this, fold the strip in half to find the center point, then bring each of the ends to this center point and use a small piece of double sided tape to stick it into place, like in the photo below.

Now arrange a number of these figure 8 loos together, crossing them at their center points and taping each one to the one below it as in the photo below.  Keep adding loops until you have a bow that is full to your liking.  You can make smaller bows to be stacked on top of wider bows, like in the photos above and at right. Finish off the center of your "bow" with a small paper strip taped into a cylinder before being taped to the center of the bow.

Another idea that's shown in the wrapped package photo above is to take two flat strips of paper, dovetail cut the ends, then glue them underneath the bow for faux ribbons.

Variation on a Theme
You can also use this idea to make elegant 3-dimensional greeting cards.  Click here for the full instructions.