Hand-Painted Onesies: Gifting on a Budget Part 2

My life is full of babies. No, not any baby of mine thank goodness…but I lead a baby-filled life. They are EVERYWHERE lately.

So I’m back to DIY-ing onesies. For other people’s babies.

These suckers beautiful items I made with fabric paint instead of felt–which is MUCH EASIER AND FASTER. Want to see my hand-crafted onesies with felt appliques? Check them out here. 

If you’ve never used fabric paint before, don’t be scared off. It’s easy to use and can be found at pretty much any craft store. Fabric paint comes in a lot of different colors and varieties–I bought pink”pearl” and silver “metallic.”

You’ll also need some paintbrushes. I like the foam-top kind, it makes distributing the paint easier than a traditional brush.

I made these stencils on the Cricut (yet another amazing use of the Cricut) but if you want to make your own sans Cricut/die-cutter, just be sure to make them out of cardstock. This way you have a good, clean edge when you paint. Alternatively, if you’d like to be even more lazy efficient than using a die-cutter like the Cricut, craft stores sell a variety of reuseable plastic stencils.

Place a piece of cardboard underneath the area to be painted and then tape the stencil on top. Then you’re ready to paint. I’m definitely not a pro at this–I use one hand to press the stencil down and then the other to paint. Which generally results in getting paint ALL OVER the not-brush hand. And in my case, a BRAND NEW MANICURE. You get three guesses as to what fabric paint doesn’t wash off of…and the first two don’t count.

One tip I can offer is to brush the paint in from the stencil edges–it helps keep the edges of the design crisper. And I should let you know that “pearl” apparently is code for with sparkley glitter and “metallic” just means…shiny.

I actually really enjoy the glitter-pearl paint. It has a nice sparkle but the glitter doesn’t rub off, so you don’t end up looking like you had a run in with Tinkerbell.

After you let the paint dry for a minute or two, remove the stencil and you’re done!

Hand-crafted, hand-painted onesie glory.

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Gifting on a Budget: Customized Onesies

For me, it’s not the Year of the Dragon. It’s the “year of the shower.” As in, wedding and baby showers.

Last year, I had seven bridal showers and this year, I’m already locked into two baby showers. And it’s just the beginning of March.

So, I’m focused on finding thoughtful gifts that don’t break the bank. Which is what spurred me to make these onesies. I originally saw the idea here on Finley & Oliver, which has a ton of great DIY ideas for kids.

You don’t need to be a master seamstress to make these, as long as your design isn’t too complex.

Here’s what you need:

• Felt
• Heat n’ Bond or a similar iron-on transfer paper
• Onesies (duh)
• Sewing machine

You can stitch these by hand, but given how much wear and tear baby clothes get, machine-sewing makes them much more durable.

I used my Cricut Expression to cut out some of the shapes, which made tracing them super fast. Else there are lots of free downloadable shape templates for things like polygons or chevrons and a quick google search will find whatever you need.

When you’ve selected a design, it’s five quick steps to handcrafted onesie gold.

1. Trace your design
2. Iron onto felt
3. Cut out the shapes and layout your design
4. Iron the shapes onto onesies
5. Stitch down for added durability

You could easily use this technique to make a custom tee or bag too.

Happy crafting!

I mustache you…

I know the mustache trend is a bit overused…but I can’t help it. I saw this easy DIY project on the Finley and Oliver blog and I couldn’t resist.

Plus, my Friday night consisted on running into not one, but TWO ex-boyfriends at the same bar.

With their new girlfriends.

Who I got to meet.

Because the new gfs “really wanted to meet me.” Which we all know means they wanted to check me out up close. Like I’m some sort of zoo animal. As I said: good luck chuck.

So, crafting fun and crazy-cute mustache items kept my mind off things (and my hands off the chardonnay and corkscrew). I cut out the letters for these on my Cricut Expression (chirp chirp!) using the Plantin Schoolbook font, with the “shadow” feature. The blue card letters were sliced at 2 inches and the green card letters at 2.5 inches. The glitter paper I purchased at Michaels–its pretty thick, so if you’re using a “slice and dice” machine like me, be sure to change the blade depth.

Now, the most important part. The mustache graphic. I downloaded an image of mustaches that I saw on the Cheddar Guppies blog. After some resizing, I traced this onto the back of the glitter paper and cut out VERY CAREFULLY. As we all know, because I am efficient (read: lazy), I use a stack of precut cardstock for the actual cards. It’s way easier than trying to cut out an exact rectangle and the paper comes in a rainbow of colors.

Arrange the letters how you like and glue onto the card stock. And then you’re set to mail out some mustache love.

Easy Paint-Stamped Stationary with Celery Roses

Easy, eco-friendly, impressive!

Yes, you stamp these with CELERY. The kind you buy at the grocery store and eat.

It’s no surprise that since I drive a Prius love eco-friendly projects, these are one of my favorite things to make. Let’s be real here, what else are you going to do with the butt-end of the celery, besides compost it?

To get these going, you’ll need paint, a brush, celery (duh) and whatever type of notecard you like to use. I buy the “small” celery bunch at the store. My paint isn’t anything special, just what I had on hand today. My notecards are 4 x 5.5 in, a good cream cardstock.

Everything you need for stationary awesomeness.

It’s important that when you cut the celery, you make a good, clean, straight chop. Else, you’ll have trouble with the stamping.

After you’ve brushed a thin, and I repeat a THIN layer of paint onto the celery stamp, press down firmly onto the cardstock to make the stamp. Make as many celery roses as you like on one card–whatever suits your taste. I like to stamp the envelopes too, to make it a matched set.

Press and stamp!

If you want to print words or a message onto the card (like I do with my cakerypapery tag), you need to do this BEFORE you stamp the celery roses–else you’ll have a very hard, messy and frustrating time running the stamped cards through your printer.

The best part? Each card is unique–no two come out alike. And, the whole project only takes one or two minutes per card (plus drying time). Can you tell why this projects is one of my favorites yet?

Not to mention, celery stamping cards would make a great project to do with children (just use washable paint!). I’ve also whipped up a bunch when I need a thoughtful but affordable gift for someone. You can see my inspiration for the cards here at Creature Comforts, where she uses the technique for wrapping paper.

Happy celery rose stamping!

Card + envelope? yes please.