Cricut Crafting Post 1: T- shirts

I am absolutely in love with my Cricut machine. I have published some of my completed works on Pintrest http://www.pinterest.com/jadekali/my-cricut-projects-and-crafts/ along with a few other crafts that my daughter and I have completed. I have decided to put together this post to with pictures and suggestions on how to recreate the project for yourself. I do not call these instructions because I just went to town trusting my own creative hand. If you complete this project or any others I post and have suggestions based on your experience, please, feel free to comment with those.

So, we all know how popular Meme pictures are these days. Most of us love the clever, witty, and funny things the people of the internet have to say and how they manipulate photos to make us tilt our heads and wonder, how on earth did I not see it before. While I was sifting through the "humor" section on Pinterest, I came across this:

and this...

I immediately wanted one for me and my daughter and so started searching for them on the internet. I came a across a site that sells them for $33 each and I about died. $33 for a shirt I can make myself. I can make myself! So, I set to work. I went searching for shirts and found that JC Penny had their Arizona cotton T's for men on sale for $7 each. I grabbed a couple and went on my way. I hit up Hobby Lobby, and Walmart for my fabric paint (Walmart buy for $3.76 ea). I only went to both stores because my daughter wanted specific colors. 

I gathered my supplies:

• T- shirts
• Cricut Expressions
• Cricut cartridge: Plantin Schoolbook
• Cardboard form or any hard flat board to put in between the shirt layers and that allows the shirt to lie completely flat. 
• Vinyl to use as a stencil. (vinyl works best, contact paper lifted and didn't provide a proper seal)
• Sponge, or a paint brush

Cut out your stencil and place on your shirt. 

Take your paint and dab it on your stencil, making sure to get a full coverage. I let it dry for a few minutes then added a second coat before letting it dry over night. 

Here's the end result of my daughter's shirt. 

The directions on the paint bottle say not to wash the shirt for 72 hours, so I waited. both shirts have been washed several times since making them and the paint is still just as vibrant as the first day. However, I do not dry our shirts in the dryer, I hang dry them as I do with most of our clothes so I'm not sure if that makes a difference or not. So, I made two shirts that cost $33 each for less than the cost of one. my total purchase was $21.52. making them didn't require a lot of my time (because I don't have much to spare), the longest part was deciding what font to use for what. My daughter did her own so that cut the craft time in half. 

Updated: 28 May 2014

My shirt completed. I used the same cartridge, Plantin Schoolbook, for mine. 

After washing the shirts over the months, mine has held up extremely well. However, I do not dry mine in the dryer. My daughter's shirt has found it's way in the dryer a few times when she washes her own clothes and hers has not held up. The paint has shriveled in places and some parts have faded. 

My little guy loves to dress up and so I am constantly making costumes. At Christmastime he wanted to be snowflake. Being a mom I was all for it, I love when children get festive and creative. So  ran to Walmart, I love Walmart during the winter season, they have Hanes brand sweat pants and sweat shirts for $5 each. We were able to make sweatsuits for children and put them in care packages for a orphanage. A friend of mine works there and said the children loved them. We plan on doing that again this year. Here is a picture of my son's sweatshirt, the others were similar. I used the Accent essentials cartridge for this project. My son picked out the picture he wanted as his snowflake. 

I found foam snowflakes at the Dollar Tree in a package of 24 I just taped floral wire to the back of the snowflakes to make them "stand" and then wrapped the wire around one of my daughters old headband's, covered the wire with tape so it didn't poke his head and viola! My little snowflake. 

Guess what? I have also found that you can use the acrylic paints that you already have to do this. All you need is a bottle of fabric medium. 

You can use this brand or any other brand that you find. I know that Martha Stewart brand works with all the acrylic paints I own Americana, Apple Barrel, Anita's, Craft Smart, and Folk Art. Mix 2 parts paint and 1 part medium. Depending on the fabric you use, more than one coat may be needed because paint may soak into the fabric. I placed a piece of parchment paper between my cardboard form and shirt so that the shirt did not stick to the board when it dried. This option was ideal for us because it allowed us to use to wide range of colors we have. The bottle was about $5.99 at Michaels but is also sold at Walmart. I have not seen it at Hobby Lobby in my town but we are slowly getting more Martha Stewart products. 

Washing has not been done using this method because we've used it for pillow covers, and upholstery. Clean up is easy, wipe down or peel off hard surfaces when dried.

Happy Crafting Everyone!

Jade