Burlap Thanksgiving Banner

 

I originally posted this tutorial over at Sugar Bee Crafts for Mandy's guest posting extravaganza. I love it so much that I had to share it with you here too. Even though it is so close to Thanksgiving.

Supplies:

• Burlap
• Fabric (in at least two patterns)
• Popcorn kernels
• Jute Twine or ribbon of your choice
• Green Ribbon
• Card stock
• Hot Glue or bonding of your choice
• Mini Clothespins
• Pencil
• Scissors
• Permanent Marker

The first thing I did was make a stencil for my burlap flags and cut them out. You can get creative and cut out any shape, triangle, circle, rectangle, etc. Set aside.

For the word Thankful you need 8 flags, 4 turkey handprints and 4 corn cobs.

For my turkey handprint I traced my Violet's handprint, no easy task for a 8 month old.

I used paper for my stencil, I pinned the stencil to the fabric and cut around. I cut the turkey hands facing in two different directions. For the letters I printed out the word "THANKFUL" in the font I liked and cut them out the same way as the turkey handprints. As you can see I don't have a machine for cutting so it is good ol' scissors for me.

Set your turkey prints and letters aside and it is time to start working on the corn cobs.

I cut a rough shape out of card stock for the corn cobs, I used yellow card stock in case any of the kernels showed through. I used hot glue as my bonding agent and I found if I started on the outside edge and went around the kernels laid out more evenly. The key to using hot glue is to lay just a little glue down at a time or it will dry before your can place your kernels.

To attach the green ribbon I folded the ribbon in half and found the middle and glued that directly onto the bottom of the corn cobs. Next I glued the ribbon to each side of the corn cob. I twisted my ribbon to make it look a little more rustic to my eye.

The next step is to glue the corn cob to your burlap. After the corn cob is glued down, I glued the ribbon to the burlap. I twisted it again as I glued. Glue all four corn cobs onto your flags in the same manner.

I found an easy way to glue the turkey handprints and letters as they were a bit floppy being made out of fabric.

Pick one end to start at, glue a small piece and attach to the burlap. Make sure you don't glue to your work surface....speaking from experience here.... Once I placed the glued end down, I would glue small sections at a time to make sure the letters and handprints lined up the way I wanted. With a permanent marker I drew legs and a beak directly on the burlap for the turkey handprints.

Next is the fun part, at least for me, attaching your flags to your jute twine. I used mini clothespins to attach mine, you could also use a wider ribbon and sew. I prefer glue gun crafting to machine sewing,

Now it is time to admire your handiwork. I think it will be easy to store since I can take the squares off the line and put them away stacked instead of bundled up on the line.

Close up of the turkey handprint and corn cob.

I have so much to be thankful for this year! Happy Thanksgiving!