Home Screen Printing

I've been wanting to try my hand at screen printing for a while now and finally got inspired this weekend. We went to the mall this weekend and I found a tiny Zoey sized Ramones T-shirt. I thought it was adorable. I've been trying to think of something that I could make for one of my friends that's pregnant. This friend is way cooler than me, so I wanted to make something extra cool. Anyways, here's how I did it.

Materials:
-Old lady Nighty (or curtain sheers, tulle, old pantyhose, etc.)
-Embroidery hoop
-Paintbrushes
-Mod Podge
-Article of clothing to put image on
-Cardboard, cardstock, a clipboard or anything hard that you don't mind getting paint on
-Fabric paint (I've heard Speedball brand is the best, but they didn't have any at my craft store. I just used Tulip brand. It's ok, but I'm going to find the Speedball kind).

1. Find or draw the image you want to use. I just found mine doing a google image search. I'm sure there's a fancy way to turn a picture into clip art, but I don't know how to do that.
2. Rummage through your bag of clothes that's left over from the old lady that used to live in our house. Find a ridiculous nighty that has a very fine mesh overlay. If you don't live in a house that has a bag of old lady nighties, you can steal one from your grandma. If that's not an option, you can go to a thrift store. Other options for materials are curtain sheers, tulle or nylons. Tulle will make a grainier picture. The finer the weave on the material, the clearer your picture will be.

3. Cut your material to be a little bigger than your embroidery hoop. Stretch the material across the hoop and screw it on tight.

4. Place your hoop over your image. Trace the image onto the material. It makes it easier for the next step if you shade in the negative space areas.

5. Using Mod Podge (because it's not water soluble), paint in all of the negative space areas. In other words, paint everywhere that you don't want the ink to be. Allow Mod Podge to dry completely.

6. Place cardboard or whatever you have handy between the layers of your shirt so the paint doesn't bleed through to the other side.
7. Position your hoop so the image is where you want it to be on the shirt. Using a paintbrush, blot the fabric paint over the screen. Gently lift the hoop off of the shirt when you have covered all of the spaces. Allow paint to dry.

8. Enjoy!

9. You can now rinse your screen off for later use.

Crafting With Abuela

Hi. Remember me? I'm the one that used to blog... As with most of you, I've been busy and I let other things take priority over blogging, and I apologize. Blogging comes first from now on! Ha! Anyways, for the past couple of years I have been getting together with Zak's Gramma to make ornaments for my family. And the past 2 years I've picked pretty difficult projects. I made these last year. I made one for everyone in my family (I'm sorry to the few that haven't gotten them yet. If you're reading this, I do have them... just haven't sent them).

This is Zak, Zoey and I snowmanned

This year, we made clothespin dolls. They were really involved, but with great results. I feel like I didn't do much. Abuela came up with the idea and she got the supplies. I painted the faces and that's pretty much the extent of my involvement. She made the little clothes that are absolutely adorable. They just came out so great! I want to keep making them! But come up with an easier way to do the clothes. I'm thinking felt so they don't have to be sewn. Anyways, here are some pics. I did lots more, but the interwobs are being slow tonight and I can't upload them all.

Mom and Dad Clothespinned

Al and Ashley Clothespinned

Zak, Me and Zoey Clothespinned (I'm thinking about cutting her legs off a little so she's shorter than us)

Zak and I in our shadow box. Zak was my favorite on to make.

Next year, we are taking it easy. Going to do a project that can be finished in one day.

I'm on a Roll!

I have been on a crafting roll this week. I've started and finished 4 projects! They were little projects, but still! Now I have so much to blag about! Having a functional craft space has really made a difference.

The project I bring you today is this cute travel wipe case. I was going to do my first tutorial on it, but I was so excited to get it done that I forgot to take pictures. That and it's so easy that I don't think a tutorial is necessary. I'll tell you how I did it though. I've made a few before but I think this is the best one yet (sorry to those who have received one as a gift from me, because this one is probably cuter than the one I made you). So cute that I think I want to use it as a clutch for myself. Just half kidding. Anyways, here is how I made it:

I've used this tutorial in the past, but this time I made some minor changes. These changes include:

1. I used felt instead of batting. Instead of using the measurements, I traced the opened case onto the felt, cut it out and hot glued it onto the case.

2. The fabric can be cut slightly smaller and it's easier if the corners are rounded and the sides contoured like the case. To do this, I just placed the open case onto my fabric and cut around it leaving extra room to wrap around the sides.

And those were the only changes I made.





P.S. Zak was all put out that I didn't post pics of our computer areas (he's quite proud of them), so I'll probably be posting those soon.

I wish I was Tiny

Baby clothes are so cute and you can find them really cheap these days. Sometimes (everyday), I wish that I had an enlarger/shrinking machine so Zoey and I could share a wardrobe. She is getting quite the cardigan collection going on and almost has as many as me. I'm quite jealous. Most of hers are cuter than mine though... Anyways, my point in all of this is that I made a onesie and matching little shoes for my niece who is due to make her grand entrance into this world in about a month. I thought it was so cute that I might make a me sized t-shirt version (because an adult in a onesie is just creepy and I can't imagine that it would be comfortable). Here are pics! I used a pattern for the shoes found here. I made some fabric yoyo's (tutorial found here) and sewed them onto a plain white onesie. It was super easy.





P.S. I gave Zoey a NutriGrain bar yesterday. This is what happened.

Pimp My Craft Space

I have a post from last week that I didn't finish with my Friday faves, but I'm going to save that for this Friday because I am just so excited about other things right now! I just finished a really cute project that I will post tomorrow. Also today, I finally got my crafting space all organized and stuff and I wanted to show you! The room was originally the living room, but we sold all of the furniture in it so it was just empty. The room is good sized and I was taking over the office with my crafts, so we moved the office and craft room downstairs. We like to keep the office and crafting areas close because Zak and I like to work side by side - him raiding and killing things, and me crafting. As a result, he knows when I need to step away from the sewing machine and I can recite most of the in-game dialogue from his WoW raids. Anyways, here are some pics:


These are my new shelves. I love them. I got spice racks to put the jars of buttons on, but I painted them and they are drying.


Here is my shoe holder thingie that holds my tools so I don't have to search.
I didn't picture my desk or Zak's desk. I didn't want to kill you with awesomeness.

There are some up sides to having the office downstairs including, when we have people over and want to craft/game, we don't have to have them cramp into the little office so they can hang out with us. Also, the TV is down here so I can watch TV while crafting!

The downside is that we are right next to the kitchen. Zak and I just polished off a box of donuts in one night... this can't be good.

Dish Cloth Apron

I was asked to teach a little workshop on how to make an apron for a church activity this month. I agreed. I have a few vintage apron patterns that I was wanting to try out anyways. Well, I sat down at the sewing machine and quickly realized that I'm not so good at sewing. Especially with a pattern. Anyways... I made the apron but it turned into a longer process than I had hoped. It ended up being cute (I'll post pics another time), but I'm just not a fast sew-er (side note: I typed that first without the hyphen and the sentence took on a whole new meaning), and it was just a plain bib style apron - not exciting at all. The next day I was chatting with a friend and she found a website with aprons made out of pillow cases and dish towels. Anyways... I went to Marshall's and found some cheap dishtowels and had at it. I didn't use a pattern or anything and I made the strings a bit too short (I either have to tie a bow in the back or a square knot in the front), but I love it. I might have to do my first tutorial on it next week. We shall see...

A long Time Coming

I suck and I have no excuses. Here are some of my fave things:

1. IKEA. We are going tomorrow and I couldn't be more excited. I just love so many things about that store including: 50 cent hot dogs, organization solutions galore, Swedish meatballs, ideas for adding pizazz to my home, the crazy carts and dishes. I love dishes.

2. This recipe. So freaking good. Seriously.

3. Zak wanted me to add the pic from this article, but I thought I would just put a link to it instead. Just a warning, there is some mild, partial Wookie nudity and the image may be disturbing. I think it's pretty funny though.

4. Speaking of Star Wars, I loved how Zoey's costume turned out. I bought her a teddy bear costume and made the hood to turn it into an Ewok. She wore that thing like a champ.



5. The Office and 30 Rock this season. Some episodes have been funnier than others, but for the most part, I haven't been disappointed.

6. Laffy Taffy. Not only does it taste delish, but it also has stupid jokes on the packages. I love stupid jokes. I mean really... perfect in every way. Except the part where I feel like I'm going to rip my dental work out and feel like I am getting more cavities with every piece of the stuff. P.S. I don't like the yellow ones. They are disgusting.

7. Easy money. I know, there usually isn't such a thing, but every once in a while I qualify for a focus group at this market research firm. Basically, you are put in a room with 6-10 people and there is a facilitator that asks questions about products and your feelings about them in general and specifically. You tell them your honest opinion and after about an hour and a half of discussion, you leave and they hand you an envelope with money in it. You can't really earn a living off of it because this place only lets you do a group once every 6 months, but once in a while, it's a nice boost. Hence the going to IKEA tomorrow. I'm organizing my craft room this weekend!

Aaaaaannnndddddd.... That's all my brain can handle at the moment. I'll be back next week with some projects I've been working on and maybe some pics of my new craft room! Yayeeee!