Never fear Suger’s, I haven’t attempted to craft with material. As promised, I am abstaining {after the damage to the sewing machine, Hubby is pretty darn happy about that}. But ’tis the season and all and thanks to Tonya of The Crafty Mummy, those of you who ARE a little craftier than I will have no sew Christmas in no time. Tonya has also posted a link to a sew version on her blog. So there you go. You’re all covered. You can thank me {or Tonya, let’s face it, she did all the work} later. Let the festive cheer begin!
Hi! I’m Tonya from The Crafty Mummy. Thanks for having me visit, Melissa! I thought I’d share a crafty tutorial with you today. I sew a lot but I have lots of friends who say they don’t sew or don’t have a machine. So I thought I’d tell you a secret… you can make cute Christmas bunting without sewing at all!
What you’ll need:
- Fabric – I used about half a metre of three different ones
- Ribbon or bias binding – I used 2 packs of 12mm x 5m bias binding and I still have some triangles left so I’ll be buying another lot
- HeatnBond UltraHold iron-on adhesive tape (I got mine at Spotlight)
What to do:
STEP 1: Create a template for your triangles. I used a piece of A4 paper, folded it lengthways down the middle, then used a ruler to rule one side of my triangle. Fold the paper in half again and cut along the line. Unfold and there’s your template. My triangle is 18cm along the base and 21cm from the point to the base line (along the centre fold).
STEP 2: Cutting your triangles I started by cutting a strip of fabric the height of my triangle (21cm) wide. I used my rotary cutter and ruler but you could easily use scissors. Then with my fabric still folded in half, I started from the fold end and laid my template with the base point at the fold. (See the picture). Laying my ruler over the template edge, I cut first one side then the other of that triangle. Then turn the template upside down and lay it against the cut edge. It should fit perfectly. Cut along the other side of the template to make your next triangles. Keep flipping and cutting until you can’t cut a full triangle. Cut as many triangles as you want. I had lots – about 100!
STEP 3: Joining your triangles. Pair up all your triangles, back to back with the right side of the fabric facing out. Here’s where you need your HeatnBond tape. Open up your triangle pair and put a strip of tape along one edge of the wrong side of your triangle and iron it into place. It only takes a couple of seconds. Do the same on the other edges. Then peel off the paper, lay your other triangle on top (you should see the right side of the fabric), and iron that one in place. Now they should be stuck together!
STEP 4: Trimming the edges. After joining the triangles, I used pinking shears to create a pretty zig zag edge.
STEP 5: Joining the triangles to the bias binding or ribbon. I stitched my triangles to my bias binding, but the HeatnBond tape would work just as well. Lay the tape along the back of your tape or ribbon and iron it on. Then remove the paper, lay the triangles in place and iron them on. Be careful that the triangles completely cover the HeatnBond so you don’t get any on your iron – it’s a sticky pain to clean off!
And that’s it. You’re done!
Another option:
If you sew but don’t have a machine, you could join your triangles with a little hand stitching like this. I used Perle Cotton which is thicker than usual cotton and shows up better.
Watch out for upside down trees!
The fabric I used had a “directional” design. That means there was a right way up and wrong way. So when I cut my triangles, some of my owls and Christmas trees ended up upside down. Rather than waste those, I used them as the back of my bunting. I made sure that one side of my bunting is all the right way up designs and I’ll hang that side facing into our room.
Do you sew?
If you want to read the sewing version of this tutorial, you can find it over at my blog: The Crafty Mummy. You can also find some other ideas for bunting over there.
Suger 
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