DIY Fabric Pennant Banner Tutorial

I’ve been working on various crafts for my daughter Tessa’s Winnie the Pooh themed Baby Shower, and I decided that while I’m at it I may as well post a DIY tutorial or two. First up? DIY Fabric Pennant Banners!

(Special thanks to my mom for allowing me to kidnap her and make her demonstrate these steps point by point while I took photos. When we were done I was like, “Look what I… uh… I mean.. you made!” Hahaha!)

Anyhow, banners are the quintessential kiddie party / baby shower / old timey go-to decoration. And they are so easy to make! I was amazed to see that these bad boys sell for upwards of $30 per 9 feet of banner of generic print on Etsy. Are you serious?! These are so laughably easy to make. Do not spend money on fabric pennant banners!!! Just don’t. Do this instead:

To Make You Will Need:

1/4 yard of each different fabric

Piece of cardboard or stiff card stock

Pencil

Pinking shears

Sewing machine

Twine

Bodkin (or safety pin)

1. Pick out the fabrics, length and size of your banner. (For my banner, I used pastel Winnie the Pooh prints from Hobby Lobby, and decided to alternate between the yellow honey bees and the tan Pooh story page print.) You can make your banner as long or as short as you want. Likewise, the individual flags can be as large or as small as you’d like, using as many different fabrics as you fancy. It’s all up to you and depends on the overall look you’re trying to go for. Decide how long and how wide you want your flag to be, and then trace out the triangle pennant shape onto your piece of cardboard or card stock. This will be the pattern for your flags! Mine were 8 inches wide by 10 inches long.

2. Using the pattern, trace multiple pennant flags on your fabrics. I should probably advise you to use a fabric pen or tailors chalk or something, but I’m lazy and I’ve found that a regular pencil works just fine. Trace each triangle next to one another, alternating up and down, so you don’t waste any fabric.

3. After tracing the flags onto your fabric, cut each pennant out with pinking shears. Pinking shears are scissors that have sawtoothed blades instead of straight – they leave a zigzag pattern instead of a straight edge cut. They prevent woven fabrics from fraying easily. They remind me of little old ladies quilting blocks. A lot of people like to sew a straight running stitch along the cut edge to insure that the banners don’t unravel even with the pinked edges, but I seriously doubt my occasional hanging of these decorations will result in any real wear and tear. So I’m keeping it simple and leaving the edges raw.

4. Fold the very top of each flag over and iron it to make the banner casing. Leave just enough room to feed your twine through.

5. Sew the folded edge down. Do this with each flag. Snip the overhang on the edges so the sides are even and you have a perfect flag shape.

6. Take your twine and feed it through the back casing of the flags using either your bodkin or a safety pin attached to the end of the twine.

And that’s it!! You’re done! There’s nothing left to do but hang your banner! You can leave as much or as little space between the flags, depending on the look you want and how you’d like your banner to drape. I’ll follow up with some pictures of these cuties at my Baby Shower which is in.. ummm.. a couple hours. Haha! Happy crafting!