In an earlier post when we were talking about my simple do-it-yourself invitations, I mentioned that I wanted to include bunting somehow in the decorations to tie in the invitations to the overall theme of the wedding. I was thinking about maybe a ten foot section or so over the fireplace and figured I could do that myself, even though I don't have any materials on hand or a sewing machine. I was thinking about using tissue paper and ribbon to cut down on cost and time.
A lady from Mr. Lemur's church who is helping out with my April bridal shower read my post and sent me an email about her making bunting for the bridal shower that I could then reuse for the wedding. How sweet is this? When I was in Detroit last weekend I went over to her house and looked through inspiration pictures—including yours, Miss Jackrabbit!
The biggest problem we had was choosing fabrics. I knew I wanted small, casual prints in shades of coral, blue, and yellow. The problem wasn't that we couldn't find any that worked—it's that there were so many fabrics to choose from! We finally decided on six different fabrics: a solid coral, a flowered coral print, a flowered light blue print, a checked yellow print, a patterned ivory print, and a flowered print that pulled in hints of coral, green, and yellow.
Even though I had been thinking just a short length, she decided to make a larger amount so that she could hang it around the room at my bridal shower. Hey—I wasn't about to complain! I have visions of draping it along the food tables or the stage.
We ended up buying 3/4 of a yard in each of the six fabrics. We then folded the fabric in half and cut it into nine inches strips, which looked like this:
We used an old Cheerios box to cut out a 7" by 9" triangle to use to trace. Then we used a rotary cutter—I had never heard of this before, but it's basically like a pizza cutter for fabric—to cut out the triangles.
The marble block you see in that picture? We used that for holding the template in place. It was so simple. Simply place the template on the fabric and zoom the rotary cutter along the edge. After moving the template a few times and a few more slices with the rotary cutter, the strip looked like this.
Ignore the rough outer edges. Those are going to get tucked under the ribbon! This picture actually shows ten triangles—each triangle is two because we folded the material in the last step. Anyway, while I was busy playing with my fabric pizza cutter, the real crafter of the two of us was applying a little bit of anti-fray glue to the diagonal edges.
Now you've seen three of the fabrics! That coral with the tiny white flowers is my favorite. After applying the glue she laid them out to dry for just a few minutes. Then it was time to sew! We had bought wide coral ribbon in the same shade as the band on my invites. After ironing it to create a crease, she started tucking the triangles in at 3.5" intervals and sewing along the ribbon. By this point I was way out of my element so I just stood and watched.
Then we stood back to admire our handiwork! After crafting about a ten foot section, we draped it along the fireplace to check it out. Hint: Each triangle was 7" wide plus 3.5" on either side. 12 triangles (two of each color) is about 129 inches, or just over 10 feet.
I'm going to pretend the reason I'm posting a really washed out picture is that now you'll have to wait around for the big reveal at the wedding! Trust me, Niki will take much better pictures and you'll be able to see our bunting in all its glory.
Anyway, I'm thrilled with the way it's turning out, and can't wait to see all of it in action at my shower and then again at the wedding. In about an hour and a half I cut out nearly all of the triangles, so now the rest of them just need to be sewed into the ribbon.
You guys are probably sick and tired of bunting posts by now, so thanks for holding on and reading! Now, tell me about the decorations at your wedding. Anyone else re-purposing shower decorations?
No comments:
Post a Comment