iLoveToCreate: Reverse-Stencilled & Spray-Painted Shirt

This is a great, fairly easy way to uniquely personalize a shirt!  My friend Brooke, co-owner of the fabulous Uptown Kids sale (a twice yearly consignment event held here in Fresno), came up with this idea and I have to say it seems to have worked out well!

First she decided that she wanted to rock a fun and unique shirt with her business initials... UPTK.

Supplies:

Tank top style shirt (or anything you would like personalized)

Cardboard shirt form-Tulip has one called a Fashion Form

Tulip brand fabric spray paint (your could use several colors if that suits your fancy)

Vinyl - cut using the Silhouette machine

• Choose a font and size that will work well for the letters of your shirt, then cut out your vinyl using your Slihouette, Cricut, or trace and cut with scissors.

• Peel letters out of vinyl and place on your shirt

• Cover your work area and spray fabric paint liberally around the stuck-on letters and around shirt until you have the desired effect

• Peel off vinyl lettering and enjoy your creation!

Thoughts:

• Wouldn't this be a great craft for a kids party or camp? 
• I thought the spray paint gave the shirt a cool effect and you could have a variety of outcomes depending on the amount of spray you want to use.
• The vinyl worked really well and provided nice crisp lines... no bleeding paint!!
• Add some spray glitter for a little more pizzaz!

**Thanks for sharing your idea Brooke!  I'm sure you will enjoy wearing it at this fall's consignment sale!!**



Fishy Themed Birthday Party: Part One, Banner

I was driving Claire to school one day when I had the idea for a Fishy Themed party to celebrate her fourth birthday.  By the afternoon I had completely planned the party on paper, nevermind that her birthday was six week away!  The pre-planning was really unlike me, but I do have to say it helped me keep my budget in check, know what I was looking for, and it gave me less stress the day of the party.  It also kept me from letting my imagination get the best of me and spreading myself too thin for a party... which I have a tendancy to do. 

Moral: Plan ahead.  It works!

Claire's Birthday falls the last week of June which is nearly always over 100 degrees where we live.  I thought the colors of blue and orange were great for a summer birthday and adding in the 'Fishy' aspect was a fun personal touch because Claire LOVES fish crackers! 

All of the decor had orange or blue included, it was actually pretty easy to find things to match the color scheme...

I made this paper penant banner using a few pieces of scrapbook paper I had on hand and my silhouette machine... it took one hour  exactly start to finish and I thought it looked absolutely adorable.  I strung it with some twine, which gave a nice touch. 

A Cupcake Birthday: Cupcake Aprons

A few posts back, I showed the cupcake clips that were the true inspiration behind the cupcake party.  Once those were made, the rest started to fall into place. 

I wanted to have a sprinkle bar for decorating cupcakes and then to have the kids make their own pizzas.  If this was going to be a cooking party, then the kids needed aprons.  I found these aprons that just so happened to have the best reviews and be the least expensive... score!   They would make a perfect party favor as well.  I opted to not have the kids decorate their own aprons, because I wanted them to use them right away, but they needed some decor in my opinion, so I went to work...

Supplies:

• Fabric, pink and brown, cut into 6 x 8 inch pieces (this is the size that fits on the Silhouette mat)
• Wonder Under (or the Silhouette brand fabric interfacing)
• Silhouette, custom cutting machine (or a very good cutting hand!)
• Sewing machine with pink and brown thread
• Iron
• Pink or Red buttons to use as a cherry

Directions:

• Iron fabric interfacing onto fabric (follow directions on the package)
• Use the Silhouette machine (or a pair of scissors) to cut the tops and bottoms of the cupcake shapes out of the interfacing [if using the Silhouette machine, there are a variety of different cupcake shapes available on the online store]
• Peel off the back of the interfacing and iron the shapes into the desired spot on the aprons
• Sew inside the shapes with a wide straight stitch.  I went a few times around each one on the top to give a little more 'shabby' effect.
• Add a red button cherry to the top of the cupcake