T-Shirts

A very dear friend recently had a birthday . . . OK it was last month! Anyway . . . she loves coffee (she has Starbucks programmed into the autopilot on her car) and she loves cupcakes. She is also a "girly-girl" / Princess-type -- she's all about nails, hair, clothes and accessories (everything we are not)! After debating about her gift I decided to create a couple of hand painted t-shirts for her gift, along with a home-cooked meal and CUPCAKES!

Now I know you are saying to yourself, "Aha! A craft that Jennifer and Dee definitely did NOT use their handy-dandy Cricut to create!!" WRONG! I most definitely used the Cricut. A new t-shirt painting method has been running rampant on the ProvoCraft Cricut message boards -- freezer paper t-shirts.

The short version of how to make these shirts is:

1. Go to the grocery, buy a roll of freezer paper.
2. Cut said freezer paper to fit your Cricut cutting mat.
3. Place freezer paper matte side down on your mat. (The shiny side really doesn't stick well, so if you're doing text you need to reverse it to have it cut properly.)
4. Choose your design and cut it out.
5. Iron the freezer paper, shiny-side down, onto your t-shirt.
6. Iron a second solid piece of freezer paper to the inside of your shirt. (This keeps the paint from bleeding through to the back side of your shirt.)
7. Paint design with fabric paints.
8. LET IT DRY! (Don't be tempted to peel it up before it has completely dried. It peels up the edges of your design.)
9. Carefully peel off the freezer paper from the inner and outer surfaces of the shirt.
10. Viola! You have a work of art that looks like it was screen-printed!

The shirts created with this method honestly look like they were screen-printed. The only drawback that we have discovered thus far is this . . . they do not like the dryer. You must wash them inside out and hang them to dry or the painted image will begin to crack.

Check out the shirts I made our friend for her birthday. I'll post more later, as I have made our daughter several shirts -- I can't get her to take them off long enough for me to photograph them!

Cup: Joys of the Season; Cupcake: Doodlecharms; Text: George & Basic Shapes.

Text: George & Basic Shapes; Crown: Iron-on design purchased at JoAnn Fabrics.

Just in case you were wondering . . .

where in the heck I've been lately! My time has been at a premium because of these beautiful little girls --

Our daughter, age 5 (who was registered for Kindergarten on Monday).


Morgan, 9 mos. old



Her twin sister, Jordan


Our niece Layla, 20 mos. old.

And her little sister, Lexie who is 4 mos. old.

I'm not babysitting the twins right now, but my gorgeous nieces arrive at our house every morning at 6:45 sharp and depart around 4:15 in the afternoon. And then Auntie Jen takes a well deserved nap after a much-needed frozen cocktail (I wish! LOL!). I have managed to squeeze out a few "freezer-paper" t-shirts over the last two months. I promise that I will try and get them photographed and up for your viewing pleasure in the very near future! Hope you are all having a wonderful summer. Only 27 days until school starts, but who's counting . . .

Birthday Cards

Demi had another birthday party to attend for siblings in her Pre-K class recently. And since my time has been at such a premium lately I didn't make their gifts. (GASP!) I know, I know . . . I'm slacking. However, I did make their cards (am I forgiven?)!

I would love to claim that these are original ideas of mine, but they aren't. I scraplifted (or perhaps cardlifted is the appropriate term) these two cuties from the Circut messageboard some time ago. Unfortunately I didn't make note of the creator's names to give them credit where credit is due, sorry! I made several changes to each card based on the supplies I had on hand.

The first card is for a little boy -- hence the frog theme! I cut the scalloped circle and the balloons using the George & Basic Shapes cartridge and my Cricut. The frog and the text are computer generated. Several of the balloons are pop-dotted to give it some dimension and the balloon strings are attached to the balloon and then to the froggy's outstretched hands (I used white sewing thread). I also used pop-dots on the scalloped circle.

The next card is for a girl -- and she is a girly-girl! The scalloped background for the cupcake was cut using the George & Basic Shapes cartridge and the Cricut Design Studio. The cupcake is from the Doodlecharms cartridge. I used ribbon and adhesive backed rhinestones to give this card some dimension. Had to have some bling for this girly-girl! The text is computer generated.