How To: Toilet Paper Roll “Christmas Lights”

Christmas decorations can be very wasteful, so why not recycle items you already have around your home? I mentioned in my How To: Transform Christmas “Candles” post that I am addicted to using toilet paper rolls in craft projects. Well, my love for them has not changed– especially after this project!  I decided to take my love for toilet paper rolls and combine it with my love for Christmas decorations. It made a beautiful combination–toilet paper “Christmas Lights.”

What You Will Need:

1. Toilet paper rolls. I probably used 1 and 1/2 rolls for this project, but it depends on how many “lights” you want to create.

2. Twine. Like I’ve mentioned in previous posts, hemp twine is more eco-friendly!

3. Paper. I used red, green, and brown scrap paper that I had left over from another project.

4. Hot glue/Hot glue gun.

5. Scissors.

How To Do It:

1. Cut your toilet paper rolls into 1/4 inch sections.

2. Hot glue your toilet paper sections directly onto your scrap paper. You can also use school glue or EcoGlue if you would rather do that (or if you’d like to make it safer for your children to participate in the project!). I used hot glue because it dries faster.

3. Cut around the toilet paper sections. When you’re finished cutting them all out, they should look like so:

4. Cut out the tops of your “bulbs.” I simply cut out a small square. You will eventually fold these in half, so make sure you make it big enough. As you can see in the picture below, I intended on using brown paper as the tops of my Christmas light bulbs. After I glued together one bulb, though, I felt like it would look better black. I didn’t have black paper, though, so I improvised. I got out a black marker and colored over the brown paper.

5. Fold your brown/black squares in half like the one in the picture above. Then, glue it to the top of the toilet paper “bulbs.”

6. Glue your twine in between your folded square. I put a line of glue at the top (where it folds), and then pushed the twine into the glue. I put a dot of glue at the bottom as well just to make sure everything stayed in place. Make sure you space your bulbs evenly on the twine! I also varied the colors (red, green, red, green, etc.) I think it would look cute with multi-colored bulbs too!

7. When I was done, I felt like it was missing a little something so I took my black marker and outlined the toilet paper roll “bulbs.” I feel like outlining it tied the tops and the “bulbs” together.

Once you’re finished, you can hang your string of “lights” on your mantle:

On your Christmas tree:

Or you can lay them on your table for a festive centerpiece:

At your next Christmas party you can explain that you made your fabulous centerpiece or adorable mantle decorations from toilet paper rolls! It’s a great conversation starter, right?