CANDY CORN BUNTING TUTORIAL

I have a little confession to make: I think candy corn is just the cutest, but I think it tastes terrible!  So, in light of the fact that I will not eat it, I decided to make up a Candy Corn Bunting so that I could enjoy it’s extreme cuteness in my house.  And just for you, I made up a little Candy Corn Bunting Tutorial.

These buntings are so simple and fun to make!  Get out your sewing machine, round up some white, orange and yellow fabric, and you are good to go!  This would be a great beginner sewing project, and kids will be able to make this one too.

Some encouragement for beginners: Just do it!  Try it and if it comes out terrible, throw it away and try again! In general I find that the first time I make a project is like a practice run, and after that I feel much more confident and I know what mistakes to avoid.  These buntings are quite inexpensive to make, so don’t worry too much about wasting money if it doesn’t come out perfect.  After all, in life is anything really perfect???

Let’s gather our materials: 1/4 yard each of white and yellow quilting cotton, 1/3 yard of orange quilting cotton, a 3-yard package of extra-wide double-fold bias tape in a matching color, thread, and basic sewing supplies.  You will need 2/3 yard of white fabric for the back of your triangles.  Also, print out your bunting template.  You may also need a pile of candy corn to snack on while you sew!

Let’s jump right in to our tutorial:

You will first cut your strips from your fabric as follows: Two 2-1/2″ strips from the yellow and white fabrics, Two 5″ strips from the orange fabric.  All of these will be cut times the width of the fabric. In other words the strips will measure 2-1/2″ X 42″ and 5″ X 42″.

Now, sew together your strips with a 1/4″ seam in the following order: yellow, orange, white.

You will have two larger strips of those colors when you are done and they will both look like this:

Iron both pieces well.  Print out your bunting template and cut it out with paper scissors.  Now you will lay out your template flush with the top edge of your strip and start cutting out your triangles.  You can either use sewing scissors (be sure to pin the template to the fabric to keep it in place while you cut), or a rotary cutter and mat. Please note that in the picture the template reaches the bottom of the white strip, but it’s a bit hard to see.  Sorry about that!:

 

You will find that if you cut these carefully you will come up with 14 candy corn triangles (the left side of the picture below) and 14 “upside-down” candy corn triangles (the right side of the picture below). Personally I think it’s fine to use both and you will get two buntings.  Now you will need to use your template once again to cut triangles out of your white fabric (14 white triangles for each bunting):

Using one pile of your candy corn triangles, sew one candy corn triangle to one white triangle, right sides together using a 1/4″ seam.  Do this for all of your triangles:

Cut the tip off of each triangle, but don’t get too close to the seam.  This will help too much fabric from being bunched up in the tips of the triangles:

Turn all of your triangles right-side out:

Iron each triangle nice and flat.  You will also need to trim off the little “flags” that stick up on each triangle.  Trim threads as well:

Open your package of bias tape and lay it out on a table or on the floor. You will need a bit of space to work.  Tuck each triangle as far into the bias tape as you can and pin into place. It is up to you how much space you leave between each triangle.  You could leave them side by side, or you could leave space. I like approximately 1-1/2″ between each triangle.  I used 12 of my triangles with this distance between each one.  Three pins per triangle will keep the pieces in place while you are sewing:

Sew along the bias tape strip staying close to the edge, but be sure to catch all edges of your triangles:

Voila!  You are done!

Now you can hang your adorable candy cane bunting over your mantel or doorway, or surprise your kids by hanging it in their room.

My hope is that this Candy Cane Bunting Tutorial was of help to you, and that it inspired some fun, seasonal decorating in your home!

Happy sewing!

***Click to download the bunting template.