Pirate Party Shirt [Tutorial]

Remember these precious pirate party invites? Well, here is another little sneak peek for you!

Big Brother can't go to the party without his very own pirate shirt! Matty B will be wearing a water shirt with a skull and bones, so he is set. So I wanted to make sure John was festive too! This is what I came up with...trying not to make it to 'skull-y' because I don't really love skulls on babies. :)






I think this shirt turned out with a perfect mix of pirate and party. Don't you?!

So, let's get down to the nitty gritty of how to make this precious shirt. (If you aren't super crafty and want to buy one of these pirate shirts, go HERE!)

Supplies:
-t-shirt (I got mine at Walmart and had to take off the front pocket first)
-fabric paint, paint brush
-freezer paper
-iron
-small scrap of fabric
-fusing (like Heat N Bond)

1. I found a picture of skull and bones online from Polish the Stars. Then I used my Sure Cuts Alot to cut out the image onto freezer paper on the circut. (I am still LOVING the cricut! My mom had to give the 'the talk' about sharing with my sisters. Bet she didn't think she would have to do that with her 30 year old daughter!).

2. Iron the freezer paper to your shirt. Then fill in with black paint. If you need more specific directions on freezer paper and using the cricut, see this old post: HERE





3. Remove freezer paper from shirt and it should leave the skull and bones neatly painted on your shirt. Awesome!

3. I used a cricut cartridge I had on hand to cut out a bandana shape. (It was the paper doll cartridge which has super cute stuff on there!). I ironed it on top of the skull, but be careful because the paint will smear. So try not to smear black paint all over your shirt! Then fill in with red paint. This took several coats to cover over the black skull.






4. After removing the freezer paper, I used the end of a paint brush to add white dots to the bandana. I did this to help blend the red because it didn't cover the black evenly.



5. I made a little party hat by cutting a small triangle from my scrap material. I then used fusing (ie Heat N Bond or Wonder Under) to iron it to the shirt. Again, be careful not to smear paint all over your shirt! I then took small strips of the scraps to make a little poofy part for the top of the hat. I sewed those directly to the shirt. And because I want to be extra cute, the scrap material is from a fabric bunting I am making for party decorations. John will match the decor! hahaha!



And there you have it. A precious pirate party shirt. I can't wait for John to wear it at the party! Like I said before, keep checking back to see what else I have up my sleeve for this party!





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Valentine's Day Shirts {with a tutorial!}

I finally got around to making Valentine's shirts for the boys. I hate making anything TOO holiday-ish because then they only wear it once or twice. I tried to make it a little more versatile (and not so Valentine's-y) so they can be my cute little love bugs all month long! :)

John will be in this heart breaker shirt because he is just so dang handsome that I KNOW he will be a heart breaker when he is older!



Matthew will look dapper and handsome in this sweet little heart tie shirt.




Want to make the heart breaker shirt for your little one? Here are the directions!

1. Using freezer paper waxy side down, cut out the letters for 'BREAKER' and iron onto your shirt. I used an xacto knife to do the cutting, but I am so horrible using that thing! Why is it so hard to do curves with it?! :( If you have a cricut or sillouette (and I am super jealous if you do!), you can cut the freezer paper on your machine which makes it tons easier to do.




2. Paint over your letters. I needed three coats of red since I was painting on a dark shirt.



Once the paint is dry, peel off the freezer paper!

3. Iron on fusing to the back of your heart material. I used Heat n Bond lite because I want to sew around the edges of the heart. Follow the directions on the package for using the fusing! Draw your shape and then cut out. I found a heart I liked online and used that as a template.




4. Iron on the heart to your shirt and you are done! (...unless you want to sew around the edges of your heart for a little extra pizazz, which I will do one day!)







Matthew's tie is super easy too so I didn't add directions. :) If you have questions, let me know!

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Halloween Shirt #2

Well, Halloween is this weekend and I never bought John a Halloween shirt! I made this one but he has only worn it once or twice. Is it just me or is it hard to match a grey shirt with shorts? (...assuming you are like me and don't have black shorts for your kid right now!) It is too hot to wear jeans, and quite frankly it is hot to wear long sleeves past 10 am!

So, I decided he need something a little snazzier for Friday when we are going to Brad's work where they have a HUGE Halloween celebration. The office is just short of shut down for most of the day as they put on skits, play games, and entertain. It is so fun! So, I had a black shirt from Walmart (still long sleeves, but oh well!) and I made a Halloween version of the 4th of July shirt.



If you kind of squint so that the white lines don't look so wavy, it is a pretty cute little shirt! I can't wait for John to wear it Friday and it is perfect because it will match Matthew's outfit which is also a black shirt.

So, which shirt do we like better? The graphic...



...or the argyle?



I can't decide which to put him in at the Halloween party on Sunday before he dons the pirate costume! I need your advice!


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Graphic Halloween Shirt - Tutorial!

Have I mentioned before that shopping for my precious baby boys is depressing? It is so hard to find cute boy stuff! I HATE that I go to a store like Target, Old Navy, or Kohl's (yes, we are on a budget here!) and there are racks and racks AND RACKS of girl clothes but only half the selection for boys. And usually the selction for boys have dorky/ugly cartoon figures. Yuck.

Thankfully my mom loves to shop for her grandkids and goes to the 'good stores'! So the boys always have some cute clothes from Janie and Jack which are a little too pricey for me. I am also thankful that I have found a couple fabulous blogs that seem to focus on making clothes for boys and among those I fell in love with I Am Momma - Hear Me Roar, who had a tutorial for a Captain America shirt. I saw this post a while ago and decided to try to make a Halloween shirt for John using a similar design.

How cute is John John?! (and he looks so old!)




So, here is how I made it.

Supplies:


-shirt (duh) I got this one at Target on sale for $1.50. Awesome!
-fabric paint
-brush (I used a sponge brush)
-freezer paper (I had to order mine from a hardware store. Weird!)
-iron
-scissors/Xacto knife

1. Print your design to whatever size you would like it to be. (I have heard you can print directly onto the freezer paper, but I always forget to do that! One day I will try it out!) Lay your paper over a sheet of freezer paper and cut out the parts of the design you want to PAINT. (see pic below for this to make sense!)

Here is the design I created on the computer using Microsoft Publisher and a pumpkin image I found on The Graphics Fairy.



2. Iron the freezer paper to your shirt, waxy side down. This will create the stencil on your shirt. Looking at the picture below, you can see that I will paint the grey parts. Everything that is under the white freezer paper will stay grey since it is covered up by the freezer paper.




3. Start painting! I painted the pumpkin white and the outer circle white. I used a sponge brush and tried to paint it to look 'distressed' but kind of dabbing the paint around and not making it nice and fully painted.



Once it dried I painted the remaining ring orange, using the same distressed technique. Well, I am pretty sure it isn't a technique, but whatev.



4. Peel off the freezer paper to reveal your final product! To seal the paint, place a cloth over your shirt and iron.



5. Put on your favorite little pumpkin and admire.






Easy, cute, and cheap. My kind of project!

I think Matthew approves!




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Gap Inspired Baby Jeans

I went shopping today and saw these cute jeans at babyGap:



I thought I could use some of John's old jeans to make cute jeans like these for Matthew. Using freezer paper and white paint, this is what I came up with in all of 20 minutes.



These were some practice jeans because I don't think Matthew will ever fit into them! He is so dang big! I am not really a big fan of skulls and I wanted to use an easy stencil so I chose stars. A bonus was that I had a star punch so I didn't have to cut each one out! I used a sponge brush with VERY little paint to make it look distressed, although you can't really tell in the picture.

My model was sleeping the whole time, so here is the best way I could show them off! haha!



If I had to do it again I would put more stars across the pants. My excuse though is the star punch broke so I stopped making stars since these were just practice jeans. :) But I bet all you crafty people out there can come up with something awesome and I would love to see it if you do!

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Big Brother design

As you may know, John is going to be a BIG BROTHER! Baby Matthew is coming next week so I really wanted to make John his very own Big Brother shirt. Nothing like waiting until the last minute, I created this design on microsoft two nights ago. I think it is really cute and was thinking I could make a freezer paper stencil with it and paint it onto a shirt. Easy peasy.



So, John and I took a trip to Walmart this morning and they had NO PLAIN SHIRTS! What?!?! (and sidenote: I get SO frustrated everytime I shop for John because the selection of boy clothes is miniscule compared to the girl clothes. Ummm...boys have to look cute too!)

So, for the time being, John may not have his own shirt. If I can drag myself to search for a plain shirt this week then John will be all cutesy. (my stomach reached full capacity a couple weeks ago and shopping for a plain shirt doesn't sound like something I want to do right now!)

BUT, I wanted to post this in case anyone wants to make one for their own kiddo...or friend, relative, stranger... {I am pretty sure you can click on the picture and save it. If that doesn't work and you want the file, just email me! :) }

If you make one, I would love to see it!

Baby Onesies

Baby Matthew will be here before I know it! So I found a bunch of John's plain onesies and invited my sisters and mom over for a night of crafting. (yes, we have matching TEAM CRAFT shirts! and yes, the pic is super dark...I apologzie!)



It was really fun (even though we missed mom being there!) and we made about 6 or 7 onesies for the baby. A couple still need to be sewn (the wonder under was giving us some trouble so I actually have to sew now!!), but here are a couple favorites.



I used a tie freezer paper stencil from Presser Foot and it is Brad's favorite onesie. It is precious! I tried to make suspenders like I saw somewhere in the blog world, but mine didn't turn out quite as cute. But, oh well!



My sister painted on the anchor since the baby's room will have a nautical theme. I think it turned out so sweet! I used a stamp to create the safety pin onesie. Kind of plain, but I am sure the baby won't notice!



I used a freezer paper stencil from Aly&Ash for the guitars. Then I just wrote in 'Mom Rocks'. This might be my favorite one...even if the writing is a little light!


Now we just need the baby to get here so we can try out our creations!

4th of July Shirt...in April

The craft show is in just TWO WEEKS!!! YIKES! Since the show is May 1st (come out to Keller, TX if you are in the DFW area!), I wanted to make 4th of July shirts to sell since that will be the next holiday. I was trying to come up with at least one style that didn't scream '4th of July' so hopefully a little kiddo could wear it for more than just one day out of the year. This is what I came up with...



...and here is how to make it!

1. I used a Cricut to cut out freezer paper stencils to make the diamonds. For this shirt I cut 2.5" squares. They ended up being a little big, so next time I would probably make 2" squares. (This step actually took FOREVER because the dang Cricut is all out of whack. So, if anyone knows how to fix a Cricut that doesn't want to cut all the way through paper without tearing as it goes, please fill me in! And yes, I replaced the blade, changed the pressure setting, changed the blade length, and the speed. I tried it all over the past couple nights and I am about to scream!)

2. Iron on the stencils. I did the center stencil first all by itself and painted the white diamond. (sorry...no pic of that!)Don't forget to put something in the shirt so the paint doesn't bleed through to the back of the shirt! Then after it was completely dried, I removed the center stencil and then I ironed on the two side stencils, making sure not to iron over the paint. I was pretty sure it would smear if I touched it with the iron!

To get more instructions on how to cut and use feezer paper, check out a previous post HERE.






3. Paint the blue and red diamonds and let dry completely. I used two coats of paint for all diamonds.



4. After removing the freezer paper, it looks like this...kind of blah.



5. Add a little detail with embroidery floss and you have a cute argyle 4th of July shirt! This was my first try at embroidery floss so it isn't perfect.




These shirts were SO easy to make, which is good since I am running out of time to get all my stuff done for the show. I am secretly hoping one of these shirts doesn't sell so John can wear it this summer in July! :)

Freezer Paper Attempt #1

Tonight was my first attemp at working with freezer paper. I have seen a couple tutorials online and it seems easy enough. I am making bean bags with numbers and letters on them for the craft show in May and thought it might be easier to paint the bean bags instead of applique them. Not sure how much of a time saver it is, so the jury is still out on how I will actually make the bean bags! Here is what I did though... (and consider this my new craft of the month for my New Year's Resolution!!)

1. Use your wonderful friend's Cricut to cut out numbers on the freezer paper. Tada!! Custom stencils! Be sure to cut on the non-waxy side otherwise your stencil will be backwards!



2. Iron the stencils to your fabric. I eyeballed the middle, which is probably not a good idea and now my bean bags will look lopsided. :) Be sure to get a good seal around the edges of the number so the paint won't leak through.



3. Gather your painting supplies, only to realize you don't have white paint or a paint brush! Lovely! So, improvise with a make-up brush and use a second choice color paint. (Make mental note to get to the store to buy correct supplies!) Be sure to put your fabric on a protective covering (like cardboard) so the paint doesn't get onto the counter or table. Lightly paint the fabric. Do not paint too much on the edges of the freezer paper itself or it will leak through onto your fabric. Wait until the paint completely dries before painting the next coat. The yellow paint took three coats and the blue took two. Again, not sure if this is a time saver, but watching The Bachelor inbetween coats helped pass the time!





4. Once the paint is dry, peel away the freezer paper. Supposedly you can use the stencil a few times, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I ironed over the paint to seal it, but not sure if that worked. And it got paint on my iron which may present a problem tomorrow when I try to iron my pants for work!



And there we have it...painted numbers! Easy as can be. My next step is to sew the back and fill it will beans. That will be saved for another night when I am not busy watching ultra-important TV shows!