a birthday shirt

My nephew had a birthday this week. His mother said that all he needed was clothes. Which is great because I had been wanting to make a shirt like this one for one of her children. She uses her camera alot. She got her first DSLR less then three years ago and has already had to replace it because she had worn out it's shutter life.

So to the shirt.

Freezer paper prints were all the rage a couple of years ago but because I am such a big procrastinator I have only done it for a few things so it is still all the rage to me ( plus there is no way I can justify to my husband why I need to spend a whole heap of money on a gocco). There are lots of tutorials out there on freezer paper stenciling so I am not going to go into the details.

Here is what I started with.

I found the image of the camera by doing a google image search. I printed it directly onto the freezer paper to save time tracing. (A note on freezer paper for Australians, it is not anything you will find in our supermarkets {please don't try go between} you can get it from spotlight or quilting shops).

One hint that I picked up was rather then buying expensive fabric paint in all the colours that you want you can just get some fabric fixative to mix with regular acrylic paints. Works out alot cheaper and you wont end up with lost of half full fabric paints that you might not ever get through (unless you go freezer paper crazy).

Ta da!

I love the way the shirt turned out (so does my son). I want to make one for myself (and maybe my sister in law) and maybe a tote bag with the camera as well. I did a few layers of paint and was a bit heavy handed with the paint on the last layer so when I washed it it did crack a tiny bit along the grain lines but I think that also might have something to do with the fabric that the shirt is made out of as well.

And one last tip: don't forget to heat set your print before you wash. I know it seems obvious but if you are like me and are trying to do a billion things at once the obvious seems to have a way of slipping my mind.