DIY Thanksgiving Napkin Rings * Moms and Crafters

Make some DIY Thanksgiving napkin rings to spice up your Thanksgiving table decor! A few years ago, when Moms & Crafters was still a baby, I designed these free printable Thanksgiving napkin rings, so I decided it’s time for something fresh. This post contains commissioned links.

When looking for the perfect little touch to add to dress up a holiday table, napkin rings are my go-to solution. You can get really creative with them and they pull together the settings.

While designing these, I started with the vision of a word written in wire, and used as an accent anywhere on the napkin.

Take that idea and run with it.

The word can be anything, for any occasion. It can even be a name, allowing these DIY Thanksgiving napkin rings to serve as place markers too!

To turn it into a napkin ring, you can be creative.

Keep things simple by curving the word and tying it in the back with a ribbon.

Use a single layer of burlap to wrap a flat napkin so the whole word shows.

Or double up for more texture.

And my favorite? Wrap the napkin with this wire word, leafy ribbon, and twine for a festive fall feel.

I’ll share with you the process for each style below!

And then you can take it even further.

There’s no reason to limit this wire wrapped word tutorial to Thanksgiving OR napkin rings (although it was inspired by my desire to publish a table decoration for Thanksgiving and my love for napkin rings).

Glue or tie it around a mason jar and fill with flowers for a Thanksgiving centerpiece.

Attach a chain to each end and wear it.

Make it in jumbo, hang some boho chic ribbons and hang from the wall to turn it into a wall hanging.

Attach a smaller chain and voila, you have a stemmed wine glass charm!

Or, do like me, and make those napkin rings shine!

To make this, I pulled out my “junk” wire that isn’t good enough for jewelry. I make lots of wire wrapped jewelry, and since I tend to experiment a lot, I buy different types of wire. I’m much pickier when it comes to the quality of my jewelry wire, and this one from my stash just didn’t make the cut.

It’s a coated wire in a tacky yellow gold that peels easily. But the color’s perfect for an autumn touch, where you don’t need it to look like classy gold. And I don’t care as much that it peels because it doesn’t get the heavy use that jewelry does and a little peeling just makes it a little more rustic (or at least that’s my story…)

You can use colorful wires for this project, and the softer the better, so don’t be afraid to work with lightweight aluminum wires, or others that might not be sturdy enough for the abuse that jewelry gets.

The napkins I pulled out for this were purchased from Minted a while back. You can use this with cloth napkins or paper napkins, but cloth gives you more volume and a more sophisticated look – as long as you’re cool with ironing them after they come out of the wash!

What you need to make this Thanksgiving craft:

20 gauge wire
Round nose or looping pliers
Chain nose pliers
Wire cutters
Optional: pen and paper to map out your text
Something to wrap your napkin with. Some options:
Scissors

How to make DIY Thanksgiving napkin rings:

1. Always start with a loop so that you have a way to connect your wired word.

2. Write your word! Tip: I recommend first writing it out roughly as you’d like it to appear so you have a frame of reference. You probably won’t follow it exactly, but it’ll help keep your vision with the typography in place.

Once you’ve made your first word, you can photocopy it to reference the rest.

To create the letters, I used my chain nose pliers to squash down sharp turns for points, and my round nose pliers to create the curves.

The photos below serve as an example for you to follow so that you can figure out the letters on your own.

The cross on the T is attached, made simply but creating sharp turns at every point.

The A is a circle…

… followed by a sharp upward turn and an almost-immediate downward turn. See the coating peeling there? That’s because of the cheap wire I used.

The F needed some added stability so I wrapped the wire around the center instead of just bringing it back out normally.

And of course, I finished with another loop.

3. Once you’ve completed the word, fix it up and tweak parts as needed. It won’t be perfect, so ditch that idea right now.

4. If you’re using it on a rolled napkin, curve your word with your hand.

5. For the “naked” wire word, cut a piece of organza ribbon and thread it through both loops. If you need to, open the loops and close them around the ribbon.

6. Slide your napkin through, and tie a bow in the back.

That’s how the “naked” version looks – isn’t that gorgeous?!

7. If you’re using burlap, cut a piece that overlaps a little when placed around your napkin. Center the word on it, and loop your loops one at a time through the weave of the burlap.

8. Measure it and glue it shut in the back.

You can also layer two pieces of burlap for more texture (but honestly, I think that was overkill!)

9. To make the leaf ribbon and twine wrapped version, start by wrapping your leaf ribbon around the napkin a few times.

10. Thread a long piece of twine through both holes in the back of your curved Thankful (or other word). Open the loops and close them around the twine if you can’t thread it easily.