Vintage Halloween Banner

Original Post: October 2017

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TUTORIAL

This super cool banner has been so much fun to make and it's actually really easy too.  I purchased this pattern from svgcuts.com - it's called "Midnight Jamboree," and I purchased the digital paper for the one below from Etsy stores HoneydesignStore and EmilyPetersonStudio .

But loving vintage Halloween decoration so much, I just had to play around with some ideas I had for making this one with a Victorian touch.  So here goes......

For the Jack O'Lanterns, I printed them out on digital paper I purchased more than 10 years ago and I'm sorry to say I have no idea who to credit for this, but it was the perfect pumpkin color.  I inked all the edges of each piece with Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Rusty Hinge, to give them more definition and also to make each layer a different shade. Then I put all the Jack O'Lanterns together according to Mary's tutorial on svgcuts.com and used pop-dots between the layers for added depth.

For the banner pages, I found the perfect paper on  HoneydesignStore on Etsy, printed and cut them out.  Next, I really love vintage rosettes and so I used my Tim Holtz rosette die and cut out several black rosettes.  I played around with several layouts before I decided on orange tinsel.  I love the way the black rosette shows through the orange tinsel!

Next, I wasn't sure how the mini vintage postcards would look but I ended up really liking it.  I decided to ink the edges of the orange circle (which I cut out with my Taylored Expressions Stitched Circle Stacklets die set) with black ink just to add a little more contrast.  I'm not sure that it really accomplished that, but I liked the effect so I went with it.

Next, I wanted to do something different with the bands that go across the top of the banner shapes.  I found some ribbon I had from years past from Recollections that went really well with the tinsel so I glued that in between the layers of the bands and then glued the bands to the banner shapes.

Since I had added ribbon between the layers I used my Martha Stewart punch to add holes to the ribbon for stringing.

I was pretty happy with how it was starting to come together but I didn't like the holes showing up so much.  It seemed like something was missing but I don't have much in the way of gems or bling so I decided to try making gems out of hot glue, knowing that some have had good luck with this.  So I just made a bunch of 'gems' - trying to get them as much the same size as I could.....

And then I used my Adirondack Alcohol Ink to turn them orange...

Then, I just picked the two that were the closest to being the same size for each banner shape and voila!  I think it made a big difference!

Anyway, I strung them with twine - would really like to improve this on the next one and use ribbon or something a little nicer, but all in all, I am pleased with the results!

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial.  Please let me know if you have any questions :)