Monday, September 5, 2011

day eighty eight: embellished t-shirt

the finished not so linear t-shirt !
day eighty eight and i absolutely love this linear t-shirt design by kacey from the blog stay-at-home artist.  i totally understand what she means by opting for solid colour t-shirts ... that's me and unfortunately i also seem to have the same tendencies with pollyanna's tee's :(  sometimes i find the pictures on little girls t-shirts way over the top and end up making the safe, it will go with everything she owns, solid colour top choice for her too now.

i pinned kacey's tee to my general crafts board months ago determined to find some fabric pens but have not yet found any.  if anyone knows where to get fabric pens in new zealand please drop me a comment.  in the mean time i thought i could achieve this type of design with some ribbons on one of pollyanna's plain white t-shirts.

you need some ribbons and a boring tee :)
i picked out some ribbons from my stash and figured i would sew the ribbons on with some of my straight sewing ;)  i sewed the ribbon bottoms to the underside of the t-shirt first so they would have a nice finish and i figured that sewing would be hidden by the ribbons on the front side (see the picture below).

the under sewn ribbons

half way there :)

the finished embellished tee

who needs linear ribbons ;)
outcome: well clearly after i had sewn the first ribbon line went out the window and i seriously thought this was going to be my first pinterest creation that didn't work out with any success.  i carried on sewing and decided not to work about the straight lines of ribbon but to just sew in the middle of the ribbon and see what would happen ... and this is the end result ... and actually it's absolutely fine!  i am totally ok with the fact the ribbons aren't straight and actually it totally suits pollyanna's personality ... the other amazing thing is that when my sweet husband saw it on her, he thought it was supposed to be like that :)  he made my day, so this ones a keeper!  i am still after some fabric pens so i can do a linear one (which is much more in keeping with my personality!).

thanks so much to kacey and her wonderful creations, she has given me the confidence to alter some of my oh so boring t-shirts, and make pollyanna's ones much more fun :)

7 comments:

Sewandthecity said...

Love the idea, what a clever and easy way to make a simple t-shirt look colourful!

Nadine said...

Well, off the top of my head . . You can use Vivid. It will fade over time, though. You can also use fabric paint in the fine-nozzle bottles - that's what I would use, and I got my ones from Spotlight. Do Spotlight not have fabric pens? If not, try an art shop or maybe even stationery shop. I think I've seen colour-in-your-own-Tshirt packs in the Maruia catalogue (they come with their own tshirt, plus fabric pens). Good luck!
(The not-so-linear ribbons DO look great! If you wanted them to be straighter, you could try using a glue stick to position them before pinning and sewing.)

Jen W. said...

So cute! A great way to jazz up a shirt and use up all those pesky ribbon scraps! :)

Christina said...

So cute!!

Kirsty, New Zealand said...

hey nadine ... i totally should have sent you a message before forging ahead with this creation! vivid's is such a great idea :) when i do the christmas tree one, i will take on board your idea about the gluing down before sewing ... thank you my dear :)

Nadine said...

You're quite welcome!

Joan Whitsett Lowder said...

WOW, I love how simple your shirt is and I can't wait to try it with some fabric scraps. Can't wait to look around your site. I love the idea, 365. Love Pinterest.