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10 Easy Valentine’s Day DIY Banners
It’s down to the wire and you’re in dire need of decorations for Valentine’s Day. Maybe you don’t have the time, budget, or resources to access store-bought decorations, but there are easy banners you can DIY in your home. These are great options to instantly spruce up your house so it’s ready to spend February 14th with family members, to set a romantic atmosphere for a dinner date, or to liven up the space for a Valentine’s Day party with friends. Don’t worry, these banners require minimal expertise and supplies! Just pick a favorite (or, whatever you have resources for,) and get to work creating one (or more!) of these adorable, easy Valentine’s Day banners and impress loved ones with your holiday decoration skills!
10. Valentine’s Day cards
This banner can be made with something that you probably have ready to go (or at least have leftover from other years): greeting cards! Why not gift your cards in a creative and decorative way? There are a few ways to do this: you could tape cards or other paper gifts along a strong string and hang where recipients can see them. You could also securely hang something like twine and use clothespins to hang cards or other small, light gifts if you’re afraid to damage them with tape. This is probably best for a party or an occasion where you have a fair number of cards, messages, love notes, or other paper gifts to give, such as a family event or party with a group of friends and loved ones. If you don’t have enough cards to hang to make a banner, you (or someone you know) may have a collection of old Valentine’s Day cards from years past that can be used to crafts. (If you have enough foresight, you can also scour second-hand stores for bags of assorted holiday cards to use in crafting if you don’t want to use your collection.) These offer more liberty for decorating as you can use only the covers (lightening the strain of hanging them) and cut them into shapes, like hearts, kisses, stars, letters–whatever you fancy. Surprising recipients with a row of hanging card gifts or repurposing the covers of old Valentine’s is a sweet way to ring the day in.
9. Sign language hands
This is probably the cutest and most unique banner/decoration idea on this list. All you’ll need is paper–we recommend colored construction paper–some kind of string to hang your decoration on, scissors, a pencil, and tape. That’s it! Start by tracing your hands on your paper lightly with a pencil. (If you really don’t want any lines to show, try using a colored pencil in the same color as your paper.) Then, carefully cut out the hand shapes. Next, arrange the hand cutouts along your string/yarn, placing the string roughly over the palm area of the hands. Now, gently fold down the center two fingers (ring and middle) and tape to the palm (while also taping over the string as to secure the hand on its place on the banner) to make the famous sign language symbol for “I love you.” Continue for as many hands you need to make the banner as long as you wish. (This is also an easy craft/activity to make with young children.) You can even go so far as to experiment with hand shapes; taping fingers down to make peace signs or cutting out two hand silhouettes in the shape of them making a heart with the index fingers and thumbs. This sweet “hand”-icraft can be done with and for anyone!
8. Giant letters
In the case of decorating with a banner, bigger is better to make more of a decorating statement! You can make an eye-catching decoration without a lot of work by cutting out huge letters from stock paper, cardboard that you can later paint–whatever’s large and sturdy. (Craft stores often have large sheets of cardstock for individual sale, and you could even get something red and sparkly, pink with hearts, whatever print you like!) Then you can string up just a few letters to make a big, beautiful statement of love, like “XOXO,” “LOVE,” “BE MINE,” “KISSES,” or any message you can think of to say. This is an easy way to decorate a fair amount of space without a ton of extra work, and can be an outstanding, main feature to your decor.
7. Paper chain – heart variation
We’re all familiar with the construction paper, stapled paper chains. This is an incredibly easy Valentine’s twist on this classic decoration. All you’ll need is paper, scissors and a stapler. Cut paper into long strips and start by stapling together the bottom of a stack of four strips. Peel the two outside strips away and down from the center two strips and join them together at the “bottoms” (what used to bes the top.) Then take two more strips of paper, placing one on each side of the heart you created, and staple the bottom of the paper stack together (which will be four sheets again. Refer to the image above if you feel off-track!) Keep gently curving the outside layers to form the pointed bottom of a heart until you have a paper chain of your desired length. This is a sweet “heart” version of the traditional paper chain, and so, so easy to make a lot of!
6. Flowers
Something that already runs rampant, or at least are more accessible, on and around Valentine’s Day are flowers! Why not use these naturally beautiful and abundant blooms to decorate a holiday where they are expected? There are a variety of ways to design flowers into a decorative banner, and you can use real flowers on the day of or fake flowers if you don’t have access to fresh flowers, want to make a banner beforehand, or want the banner to last year after year. As for style, you can simply tie stems together, use just the bloom part of the flower and sew them together, or weave them into a garland. Fake flowers (which, c’mon, these days are just as gorgeous as real) are easier to manipulate into a banner/garland since they are more durable, but real flowers will offer a lovely aroma to the atmosphere. You could even thread together petals and leaves from a bouquet of flowers if you really need your resource to stretch. See what you can get a hold of and design a stunning flower garland!
5. Lipstick kisses
This is an especially romantic idea to craft for your lover, partner, husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend, etc! (As well as a cute idea for families!) You will need to have or to obtain a variety of different lipstick shades, but besides that you’ll just need a surface to kiss! Something like small envelopes, paper cut into hearts, love letters, a picture of your intended target’s face(s), post-it notes, tissue paper, doilies–any kissable surface or material you can think of to string into a lovely decoration. Just liberally apply your signature lipstick, or a different range of shades to add visual interest, and pucker up to make your mark on each element in your banner. This is an utterly charming way to display your love for the Valentines in your life by showering them with your very own kisses!
4. Heart playing cards
Playing cards are something else that you should have around your house already, or at least is very easy to get a hold of inexpensively, such as at dollar stores or drug stores. You may need to get your hands on a few more decks that you can destroy for crafts in the name of love as you’ll only want to pick out the “heart” suit of playing cards, of which there are 13 in a single standard deck. This is a clever idea for decorating for Valentine’s Day for if you are planning to host a game day with friends or for a family who loves playing games together. There are also many ways to display these in banner form, such as using a single-hole punch in the top two corners of the cards and stringing on yarn. If you don’t have any extra cards to damage, you can always use tape or the clothespin method. (Small craft clothespins are easy to find at craft and hobby stores.) It’s also nice to add a flourish to fill the string of cards, such as flowers, ribbons, tassels, cut out hearts, photos, paper scrabble letters, dice, etc. This will be the perfect thing to play Valentine’s Day games under!
3. Doilies
Doilies may be seen as old-fashioned or out of style, but they are such a delicate, feminine, and romantic decoration that you can use many ways! Doilies look so complex to decorate with even if you just tape them up around your home. There are often red, pink, and white specifically heart-shaped paper/tissue paper doilies available to buy at stores. However, this certainly isn’t necessary for your doilies to scream “Valentine.” You can use plain white doilies strung together and achieve the same pretty and romantic look. You can paint or color them, cut them into hearts, bunch them into lovely doily-edged paper flowers, attach strings of them to hang along down from a main banner, and more. They are a great decoration tool since, as mentioned, you didn’t have to work for that complicated look, they are cheap and very plentiful, and they are so lightweight you can really go crazy in how you choose to display them.
2. Tassels
Though tassels are certainly available store-bought, they are somewhat easy to entirely make yourself! They do take a little time, but once you get the method and practice down, you’ll never forget! There are two different ways to create a tasseled look. One alternative is to tie strips of Valentine’s Day-colored or patterned cloth/ribbon in knots around a main string until it’s full and fringey. This is the most basic and most simple method of “tassel” style banners. For the more complex way, you’ll need lots of tissue paper of your choice, tape, and scissors (or an exacto-knife, cutting surface, and ruler or board to cut against.) It’s easy to look up how to make a tissue paper tassel on the internet, and there are a couple different approaches out there.
1. Candy hearts
What better way to ring in February 14th than by using its most iconic sweet treat to decorate with? Giant-sized candy conversation hearts have the color palette fit for Valentine’s Day decorations. Just color, paint, or get paper in the iconic pastel-y colors of candy hearts: pink, sky blue, pale yellow, lavender, white, light green, and pale orange. (You can add a shadow on the edge of one side for more dimensionality if you wish!) Then you can customize any kind of messages within the hearts, from the very traditional to the very personalized. Just use red for your lettering so they look even more like candy hearts. Conversation hearts are too cute and a great way to add a little more color to break up all the red and pink.