diy tutorial Archives - 2 Sisters 2 Cities

I realized the other day that we have hardly any Halloween decorations in our house besides our cheapo plastic pumpkin that holds candy. I didn’t want to spend too much money considering Halloween is only five days away so I decided to just focus on sprucing up our fireplace mantle. The Halloween pennant banner is really easy to make and I’ve got a free printable below so you can use the same spooky letters if you want.

I picked up a few other decorations for the mantel earlier today. The glittery pumpkins were 50 cents a piece at Michael’s. I found the owl at Marshall’s for less than $10. My husband and baby T and always complaining that an owl outside keeps them up at night so I thought he would fit in perfectly to our Halloween display. I bought the baby pumpkin a few weeks ago. All the other pumpkins I bought at the time have since rotted so we need to pick up a few more this weekend for carving.

Halloween Pennant Banner Tutorial

Materials Needed:

Orange, black, and white cardstock
A few yards of rickrack or another type of string/ribbon
Double-sided tape
Masking Tape
Large scallop punch (this step is optional if you don’t have one)
Ruler
Scissors
Pencil
Halloween candy to munch on

Directions:

Use a ruler to make a template for the pennant flags. Mine measured out 6 inches on the short side and 9.5 inches on the two long sides. Sketch out the measurements with a pencil and use scissors to cut out the flag. Use this flag to trace 13 additional flags alternating the paper color if desired. Cut out the rest of the flags.

Use a scallop punch to make 14 scalloped circles (Alternative idea: if you don’t have a scallop punch, you could use a can to trace a large circle.) Print out the font templates below if you want to use the same message and font on my banner. (For Macs: Save the two jpeg files and open it in Preview to print.) If you want to create your own message or use a different type of font, I highly recommend checking out picmonkey.com. They have a lot of different Halloween fonts right now as well. Trace a small circle (I used a small can) over each letter and cut out the 12 letters.

Use double-sided tape to attach the scalloped circle and font circle onto the pennant flag. Lay out the rickrack and tape the flags to the rickrack using masking tape. Hang the Halloween pennant banner on your mantel, step back, and admire!

rolling storage cart do-it-yourself tutorial

One of my favorite retailers, Serena & Lily, is selling these adorable vintage-looking rolling storage crates in their baby section. I fell in love with the little carts. I realized I already had unfinished crates very similar to the ones featured in the S&L catalog, as well as some ball bearing casters leftover from a previous project. I decided to turn this into a little DIY project and made one for less than $15 since I had some of the materials on hand. If you have none of the materials, it will cost you about $30 to make a rolling storage crate.

rolling storage crate

The rolling storage crate is perfect for storing the many books we have in our household. My son loves pushing it from room to room.

rolling storage cart books

Alternatively, it also makes great toy storage bin as well. Here is the cart filled with trucks, cars, trains, and plains:

rolling storage cart toys

Here are the materials I used on this project:

rolling storage crates materials

Unfinished wooden crate– approximately $9.99 (be sure to use a coupon if you buy it at Michaels)
1/2 pint Old Masters Wiping stain (I used Early American 11716)
Four 1″ ball-bearing swivel casters
Letter stencils
Stencil paint
Stencil brush
Cloth or rag to apply wood stain
8 small screws
Drill
Screwdriver

I started off by applying the stencil to the crate. I chose to write “Books,” but you can be more creative with your wording if you like (the Serena & Lily crates say Soft Drinks, Lemonade, Super Seven or White Star.) I was going for a retro font from the Mad Men era, but I think the font ended up feeling a bit more old west saloon. I still like how it turned out, but it wasn’t what I originally had in mind.

Once the stencil was dried, I applied a wood stain. I used a cloth to apply it. Since I wanted the rolling storage crate to have a distressed feel to it, I pretty much slapped the stain on and didn’t worry about making the coverage exactly even.

The wood stain took about 24 hours to dry. I recommend putting it outside if it’s nice out or in a room you are not using- the fumes were a bit strong while it dried. Once dry, I used a screwdriver to screw the ball-bearing swivel casters on. Each caster had room for 4 screws, but I only used the two outer wholes (photo below.) If I used all four screws on each caster, the screws on the inside of the crate would poke through the bottom of the crate. Since the casters are not being used to support a person’s body weight, I think two screws on each caster would be sufficient. You could use a drill to put eight starter holes (two per each caster) in the crate, but I ended up putting the screws in with just a screwdriver.

wheel

I love how this DIY project turned out! Have you ever been inspired by something you saw in a catalog and decided to make it yourself?

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