Silhouette UK: Simple printable canvas for child's name banner

The arrival of our second grandchild is imminent, and one of the benefits of today's technology is that we already know that it is a boy, and his name has been chosen. Fingers crossed they don't change the name on his arrival! As I chose straight sided shapes, there was no need for registration marks, and this meant I could print my design across the whole of the A4 canvas sheet, and simply use scissors. If you want to cut circles or stars for more interest, then you will need to enable registration marks, and make sure at the very end of your design, before sending to the Silhouette, that you only cut the edges you want, and not every gingham stripe, and every letter!

As I have written this tutorial, I think it is good for a beginner. If you are unsure where a tool is in the software, simply hover with your mouse over the various icons at the left hand side and at the top.

Although it does not say it on the the packaging, the canvas comes with a ready-to-stick backing, so it is not totally flexible like material, and could not be used to make a bag, although you could make a shape, stick it to a canvas bag and then sew around it.

I decided to design my own gingham pattern in the software and print squares in different colours with the letters of my grandson-to-be. Then I added triangle pennants between each letter bearing an item that starts with the letter it follows. Each square had a small bit of wadding inserted as I machine sewed the squares closed. The triangles were simply stuck together using their own sticky backing. As the shapes all have straight edges, I did not cut them out with the Silhouette Cameo, but simply used scissors. However if you want to use other shapes such as circles, stars, hearts or even padded letters, then print registration marks on the canvas, and do a Print and Cut as normal with your Silhouette.

To make it more personal, I have a box of small shell buttons that were passed down from my Grandmother to me. Some are actually attached to real silver foil which has tarnished, so they probably date back to at least the 1930s. It appealed to my sense of family history that my Grandmother's great, great, grandson would have something that she had handled, so I hand sewed buttons on as I attached the hanging loops of ribbon. Finally, once my grandson arrives, I will make another triangle to go at the start with his birth date. Let's get started!

SUPPLIES:

Silhouette Printable canvas x 2 sheets
Scissors
Ribbon
Cord
Buttons or other embellishments

MAKING THE BANNER:

1. Using the Rectangle tool, draw a rectangle 0.25 cm x 6.5 cm, and fill it with red. Under advanced Fill settings reduce the transparency to 60% and then replicate it to give 10 stripes in all, spacing them out evenly so that they are approximately 6 cm apart. Select all 10 stripes and group. Go to Replicate and choose Rotate one copy. You should now have a grid similar to the one shown below, on the right. Group it all together.

Copy the gingham grid so you have 12 in all, as shown below, changing the fill colour as you want. Go to the text setting at the left hand side and choose a font. I simply used Arial for ease of reading. Make a single letter and by selecting it and a gingham square, go to the alignment tool and pick Centre. Repeat these steps for your other letters. This was my sheet, ready to print. I fed the canvas sheet into my printer and it printed beautifully.

2. To make the triangle pennant, select the Polygon tool on the left hand side. Hold down your shift button, left click with the mouse, move it to the right and click again (still holding down the Shift). You will have a straight line. Release the shift button and click where you want the third point to be. Move your mouse over your starting point and click again. You should have made a triangle! I used a gingham square as my guide. Move the triangle to the side and select it. Go to Replicate and Mirror above. Move the top triangle so it overlaps slightly with the bottom one. Select both shapes and Weld. You should now have a diamond.

In order to see where to cut the triangle with scissors, we need to print a line around it. With the shape selected, choose a line colour. I usually pick a grey, then go to the Line style window and set the line to be 0.2.

3. Replicate the diamonds so that you have as many as you want. I made six. I have made the backgrounds white for you to see the diamonds more easily. Pick some pictures from your library to use. A simple shape like an anchor can be filled with colour or pattern (rabbit and heart). Shapes that come in different pieces, like the robin and ice cream will need to be filled, and then re-constructed, making sure pieces are on top of each other in the correct way. Select a shape then go to Object/Arrange, bring to front/back. Once they are in the right place, pop another canvas sheet in your printer, and print.

4.Cut out the squares and diamonds with scissors. Machine sew letters, inserting some small pieces of wadding as you work. Fold each canvas pictures in half and stick them flat together. Attach ribbon, buttons and any other embellishment as shown.

When hanging the banner, make sure it cannot be pulled down by a baby or toddler. Rather than above a cot, it should somewhere safe, such as along a wall or across a door.

I hope my walk through is clear. If you have any questions, please ask, and I would love to see any banners that you make.