GAP Inspired DIY ‘Good as Gold’ Stencil T Shirt

There are two forces driving this DIY today:

1. the insanely cute “Good as Gold” GAP Kids sweatshirt that didn’t come in the size I needed (hat tip to Candice who found it first!) and

 

2. these precious non-green  St. Patrick’s Day hair clips by our friend Kelly at Cloudy Day Grey which gave me freedom to think outside the green box for St. Patrick’s Day.

You’ll need a t-shirt (long sleeve or sweat shirt), vinyl for your cutting machine (The ‘right’ material is the stencil material but I had regular vinyl so thats what I used.), fabric paint, scissors and a stencil brush (or sponge brush). I also used a little foil to line the tee so the paint wouldn’t seep through.

I used my Silhouette design software to layout the words in two fonts and cut the words out with the Silhouette. Carefully peel the letters out and separate the backing from the ‘negative’ image thats left and place it, adhesive side down, on the tee. I chose fonts that had letters with centers and detail – you don’t *have* to put the pieces back in but I wanted to retain those details so I fit the ‘centers’ of the O, D, G and Ls back in.

Use gentle pressure to pounce the fabric paint onto the stencil using a straight up and down motion. I did three light coats with about 5 minutes of dry time between coats.

When you’ve reached even, solid coverage and the paint is just dry to the touch, remove the largest part of the stencil. Then carefully remove the guts of the letters. I used a pair of tweezers to get the tiny part of the “l” loop out. 

 

Let the paint finish drying and follow the paint directions for setting and washing/drying if needed.

 

Voila! A tee thats perfect for my treasure this St Patrick’s Day and beyond. Next up, making a green bow – because it seems that Vivi has every other color in the rainbow BUT green!