Welcoming Pennant

I've been wanting to make a pennant banner for ages and I thought it would be the perfect thing for the blank space to the left of the front door.

Since it is summer and the weather has been warm I decided to make the pennant bright and welcoming. I kept to what fabric I had on hand (leftovers from quilts I have made) and chose a range of blues, greens, yellows and pinks. Then I did some googling (the English teacher in me loves that googling is now an accepted and understood verb but I digress). There are millions of patterns, plans and places to buy a pennant pattern but the over all idea is really simple.

Hardware:

• Pinking shears
• Cutting mat
• Rotary cutter
• Quilting ruler
• Sewing machine
• Pins (if you are a novice or pickier than me)

Software:

• Pretty fabric
• Paper to cut your pattern from
• Felt (for letters)
• Coordinating thread
• Bias tape (or ribbon)

Step 1: Decide on the shape of your pennant triangle.

Step 2: Cut out triangles from fabric (I did a front and back but you don't have to if you know you aren't going to see both sides) This is made a lot easier if you have a rotary cutter, cutting mat and quilting ruler but you could always pin your pattern too.

Step 3: Arrange the triangles to your liking (this is way harder than it looks but maybe it's just me)

Optional Step 4: Cut out and place your message (you can see I reversed these steps but it doesn't really matter). I wanted mine to say welcome so I picked a pretty yellow felt, printed out some letters and cut them out.

Step 5: Sew triangles together. Now depending on what style you are going for you can do this right side in and flip them out for a more finished seam or you can do them right side out and pink the edges (using pinking shears to keep the fabric from fraying). I liked the more casual look of the pinked edges so I went with that. This would also be the time to sew on your message if you have one.

Step 6: Sew pennants on to your coordinating bias strip. In hindsight I would have used a double fold instead of a single fold but oh well. You might want to pin your pennants on the bias first to get your spacing even but I am beginning to feel like pinning is to sewers as taping is to painters. You only need it when you are new or for the really tricky bits.

Step 7: Stand back and enjoy your amazingness.

You can see the finished pinked edges a little better here

They won't be staying here long but I love how bright and happy they look. Just what my newly remade front porch needs!