A few months ago, I made a name bunting for my niece Everleigh for her first birthday. I loved making it and so when my niece Claire turned three back in April I decided to put my bunting chops to work once again and make her one as well.

Happy Birthday Claire!

But I was still in the mood to sew.

I love the look of these so much, I knew I also wanted to make one for nursery to stretch across the wall above the crib. This was going to take a lot of triangles. I made a template and hunkered down.


Once you've got your triangles sewn, I trim the tops to make sure they are even and then pin them between the fold of the bias. Then I let 'er rip on the 'ol Pfaff.


I overshot the measurements on the bunting (surprise, surprise), so I ended up with a few extra feet of bunting, but better too much than not enough. I tied a bow at each end and nailed it into the corner where the wall meets the ceiling.

Another nursery project complete!


Full nursery reveal coming soon... (hopefully before the baby!)

Where does the time go?

My sweet niece Everleigh is already one year old!

I heard that Ev recently moved into a different bedroom, so I thought a name banner to decorate her new digs would be a fitting birthday gift.

There are quite a few tutorials out there for bunting flags, but none were quite what I was looking for, so I came up with this on my own.

This is a project that you could easily complete in an afternoon.

Supplies:

• Layer cake pieces (10" x 10" pieces) in a design of your choice (I used Oh Deer by Moda, which I love)
• Contrasting fabric for the letters
• Contrasting thread
• Bias tape in matching or contrasting colour (I chose a medium size bias tape, not quilt size)

Since Everleigh has 9 letters in her name, I needed 18 pieces to make the bunting double-sided. I found that layer cake pieces worked perfectly for this project, and you can get two pieces out of each 10" x 10" square. (You might want to make a paper template to trace from like I did)


Once I had my 18 pieces, I arranged them in an order I found appealing (front and back).
I found a free font that I liked called Creative Block BB from 1001freefonts.com and typed Ev's name into an 8.5 x 11 document at 250 points. I upsized the document during printing to an 11 x 17 document.

Then, I set the contrasting letter fabric on top of the letter template page and traced the outline of each letter directly onto the fabric.

I applied fusible interfacing to the back of the letter fabric and then cut out each letter. Then, I applied the letters to each of the flags.

After that, it was time to practice my machine applique stitching. I created a sample flag to practice on, but I also came across this great tip for machine appliqueing so that you get a nice clean corner.



You'll want to increase density of your zig zag stitch for appliqueing as well.

It was while I was appliqueing the letters that I thought, "Whew! Everleigh has a LOT of letters in her name!

Once the letters were sewn on, place the right sides of each flag together and sew with a 1/4" inch seam.

Turn the flags carefully (or use a bamboo turner) and then give each of the letters a spray with speed starch before a ironing them flat.


Leaving at least a foot long tail on each end of the bias tape, pin each of the letters into the inside fold of the bias tape and sew using a zig zag stitch.



Tuck the ends of the bias tape in and stitch in place.

And voila! Admire the results:



Pop it in the mail - and wait to hear from...





...another satisfied customer!