Adorable crafty banners are everywhere this Halloween, draped across mantles, skirting tables and strung across fences. Instead of purchasing letters or fiddling with tracing around water glasses, I created letters with circle templates on the computer. They worked so well, I decided to post them here for everyone to use. Now you, too, can easily print, cut, and tape your way to a fun or spooky Halloween message in about an hour.
Supplies
All you need, besides a computer, printer and my downloadable letters is:
A. Scalloped scissors (optional)
B. Regular scissors
C. Hole punch (preferably a rectangular punch)
D. Double-sided tape
E. Medium ric-rack long enough to hold all of the letters in your message
F. Heavy black and white paper (preferably card stock)
Download and Unpack The Letters
Before you begin, you will need the letter templates I've created. To download, right click the link below and select "Save Target As..." and save the file on your computer. Make sure you remember where you save it.
Letter Templates (.ZIP)
Once you have saved the file on your computer, open it up and copy all of the letters from inside the file to a file folder on your computer. There is one file for every letter and symbol.
Select Letters
Now you will need to create a word processing file with the letters you need. Open a word processing program such as Microsoft Word and create a new document. In that document, insert a copy of each letter you need. In Microsoft Word, you would do this by clicking Insert -> Picture -> From File and selecting the letter file you need. Include a copy of every single letter needed. For example, if you are creating a banner that says "BOO" you will need one "B" and TWO "O" templates. To get the most letters on a page, you will need to set your margins to the smallest possible setting. How small will depend on your printer. I could set mine to .15", which allowed me to have two letters side-by-side on an 8 1/2" x 11" paper.
Print
Print the letters on a heavy paper or cardstock, then cut into manageable sizes.
Construction
1. Cut around one of the letters with regular scissors.
2. Use this to trace onto the back of the black paper. Make a circle tracing for each letter in your banner.
3. Cut out the black background circles with the scalloped scissors if you have them. If you don't, plain round circles cut with regular scissors will work as well. Cut a little wider than the traced line to make the border.
4. Cut the letter circles out with scalloped scissors, if available, or regular scissors if not. Cut slightly inside the line so that none of the line will remain on the circle.
5. Place two or three peices of double-sided tape on the back of each of the letter circles...
6. Stick each white letter circle to the front of each of the black circles, taking care to center the letter circle to make an even border.
7. Next you will need the hole punch. Your banner will hang straighter if the ric-rack stays flat when threaded through these holes, so if you have one available, use a small rectangular punch that's slightly larger than the size of the ric-rack. Punch two holes at the top of the letter with a small space in between.
8. Thread the ric-rack through the two holes.
9. Voila! One letter threaded. Now thread the rest and you'll have a charming, crafty banner for your Halloween decorating!
Let me know if you try this or if you have any questions about using the letters. I hope you enjoy it!
