My son’s birthday is coming up. He requested a race car party. And what is a race car party without a checkered flag pennant? I have never made one before, so I made things up as I went along. First I went to Hobby Lobby and purchased 4 felt sections (2 checkered, 2 red felt, 2 black) to use as the flags for the banner, and one package of black bias tape (4 yards).
Using a ruler, I measured out 3 equal flags per piece and cut them out.
After I had all my flags cut, I arranged them on the floor into a pattern that appealed to me. I originally started out using one checkered, then one red, but it didn’t look quite right to me. I went back and bought some black felt to add to the sequence and was happy with the change. If you are wondering why some are cut in half, I was originally going to sew the extra pieces (produced from cutting the main flags) together to make additional flags, but later found I had enough whole pieces and did not need to do this.
When I was happy with the pattern, I took out the bias tape and pinned the triangle flags in place (sandwiched in the middle). I left about a foot of bias tape on each side for tying the banner.
Using my old, basic sewing machine, I sewed a straight line across the bias tape, and voila cute race car pennant!
Making the banner took me approximately 45 minutes to do, but will probably be faster in the future now that I have made one.
Cost of materials:
2 checkered felt sections – $1.00
4 solid felt sections – $1.00
1 package black double fold bias tape – $1.15 (on sale)
Total cost = $3.15!
