Deeds & Petunia: Big Top Love Mini Banner DIY Project

Those little chipboard flags had been sitting around in my craft drawer forever. They would cry out to me every time I rooted around in there for something. My kids have been home because of the teacher strike, and we had decided on craft time to keep busy for a couple hours. They painted magical deer habitats and created 3-D drawings. I made this.

Big Top Love Mini Banner

You'll Need:

4 Chipboard flags
2 coordinating shades of acrylic paint (I used a metallic pearl finish paint)
Black glossy acrylic paint
3 small foam paintbrushes
Brown stamp ink pad
Scrap of textured fabric (I used a scrap of courdory. Flannel works good too!)
Hot glue
Yard of coordinating ribbon
Small letter stencils

Paint the flags with a few coats of paint - two green, two pink. For a more finished look, paint the backs as well. Acrylic craft paint dries pretty fast, thank goodness! Let dry.

Bunch up your fabric scrap and press into the ink pad a few times. Gently rub and blot ink around the flag. Rub onto the edges and corners to give it an antiqued finish. Let dry.

Use stencils to paint a letter from the word LOVE onto each flag (L&V one color, O&E another) by dabbing with black paint. Be careful not to overload the brush or the letters will look muddled! Blot before painting.

Using the alternate color, carefully dab little bits of paint with the corner of the foam brush. Again, be sure not to overload the brush - blot it before dabbing onto the flags. The goal here is for it to look like flecks of paint, chips, scrapes. Let dry.

Heat up a glue gun and glue letters to a length of ribbon leaving about 2 inches between letters. Make a line of glue on the front of the letters and press the back of the ribbon into the glue - it's hot and bonds quickly, so make sure you're careful!