A few months ago my friend asked me to make her a birthday banner for her daughter’s first birthday party. I wanted the banner to be sturdy, so I ended up using decorating old CDs covered with patterned paper. I then drilled holes through the CDs, attached eyelets, and strung the circles together with some string through the eyelets:

I think the banner turned out cute and my friend was happy with the results.

In addition to making magnets for the craft fair this weekend, I also decided to make a few paper banners as samples to take custom orders. I decided not to use the CDs this time because I thought they added too much weight to the first banner I made.  I also invested in a circle cutter (HUGE time saver & much better looking circles) and put the holes on the top of the circles rather than the sides. This made the banner easier to hang up because it laid flatter. I freehand a little whale out cut out made out of glitter paper to separate the words “Happy” and “Birthday”. Here’s the final product.

I’m really thrilled with how this turned out. I’m going to try to make a few more samples before this weekend :)