Perfectly Flawed: 4th of July Banner Tutorial

Well, I'm just crankin' them out this week! I've been inspired by all the craftiness I've seen on various blogs and I decided to actually do a little decorating for the 4th. Here is a tutorial for a 4th of July banner.

Materials:

scrapbook paper (cut to 8 1/2" by 11")

strips of 1 inch fabric or ribbon, 2 1/2 yards

printer

sewing maching

coordinating thread

Directions:

I started by making a template of the triangles. I don't have any fancy editing program so I just used Microsoft Word. I made it so I could fit two triangles on a sheet. I used a Microsoft shape (you know, Insert, Picture, Auto Shape, select triangle) and had it measure 6 3/4" length with a 5 1/2" width. Play around with it until you get your deisred size. Then add your text in each triangle. My font is from 1001 Free Fonts, it's called "Boyz Are Gross NF" (I don't know why!) Make sure you can see the outline of your triangles so know where to cut them.

I dug through my leftover scrapbook paper and found some navy blue and deep reds that I liked. All of my paper was 12"x12" I needed to cut it down to 8 1/2"x11" so it would fit through my printer.

Now, if you're a little, um...quirky, like myself, go ahead and plan out the order of your colors. I only share this picture with you because

I trust that you can totally relate!

So once you have your colors planned out, go ahead and print off your sheets. Again, I printed two triangles for each page, I had 4 blue pages and 4 red pages. Each page had a letter in one triangle and a star in the other.

Next cut out your triangles.

and you get these lovelies

Now, lay out your lettered triangles,

then insert your starred triangles, rearranging until you find a layout you like

(even with all my planning I still found myself switching them around) :)

Time to get your fabric strip or ribbon ready. If you're using ribbon, skip the next couple steps. For my fabric strip I pulled out every piece I could find of this leftover muslin lining from Christmas stockings I made last December.

I love the look of this fabric and thought it would be perfect for this project.

After ironing I cut one inch strips as long as possible (I was working with a bunch of scraps). You will need about 2 1/2 yards total.

I cut it by pulling it through my sicssors to give it a rough look.

Okay, now for the sewing part and don't be scared to sew with paper, this was my first time and it was so easy and turned out great!

I grabbed a piece of scrap paper and ran it thru my machine to find the perfect size stitch. I used a zigzag stitch, the winning stitch size is the last one on the far right.

Here is my stitch length

and my zigzag size

thread tension was a 1 (the lowest on my machine is 0)

Lay your first triangle on your strip of fabric and figure out how much you want to leave on the end. I left about 3 to 4 inches.

Start at the end of your piece, using a 1/4" seam allowance and start stiching (be sure to do a reverse stitch to secure your stitching)

Once you have your desired amount on the end, place your first triangle on your strip, lining up the edge. Continue to stitch across your triangle.

I wanted 2 inches between each triangle, I taped this guide to my machine and when the end of the previous triangle hit the 2" mark I placed the next triangle on the on the fabric strip to sew in place.

Fold your triangles into a neat little pile as you stitch each one on to your fabric strip (note: if you're using scraps of fabric like myself, continue to add each piece, I used about 3 total, as you go, sliding it under a triangle and overlapping with the previous piece of fabric.)