papaeel's non-homemade father's day gift finally arrived earlier this week! he is forever searching for a pick & since littlemaneel has been old enough, he's loved nothing more than finding picks & putting them in hollow body openings, down vent grates, or in secret places around his playroom. i first saw the pick punch on pinterest late last year & was intrigued as all one needed was an old gift card or the like & wah-lah, you could make a pick in one punch! a genius creation that i actually forgot about until recently. papaeel has been jamming with friends regularly these last few months & the need for picks has become more & more prevalent. late one night after papaeel had gone to jam, i was straightening up & thinking about what the perfect gift would be this year. i just so happened to find a pick in the couch cushions & suddenly it came to me, "the PICK PUNCH!!" i immediately got online & began to search. no one in town carried it, so i ordered it online. you can purchase the pick punch from a few places, but i decided why not go with the source & bought it directly from the creator via www.pickpunch.com. we bought a few sheets of delrin too, but are still in need of proper ink before we can design our one of a kind picks (they also sell the ink, but i was sure the pigment ink we had would work-it didn't). if they turn out well, maybe we'll even sell a few at the record store! stay tuned for DIY picks to come........
garage sales can be great, can't they? littlemaneel & i went out deal hunting with grandma & found a sweet spot on the edge of my sister's small town with tons of stuff & everything 1/2 price! i hit the motherload of vintage crafting books & even scored a nice collection of classic poems & a vintage book of children's fairy tales too. i walked away with an arm load & all for a whopping 35 cents!! these little vintage embroidery booklets are delightful!
has it really been 8 months since i last posted?? wow! that's nearly long enough to cook a baby in a belly oven (fyi-that's not what we've been doing)! we've just been busy working, playing, making, pinning & the like. so, today is father's day. i was really hoping to post this freezer paper stencil tutorial before today, in case those of you out there would like to make your own father/husband, etc.. a matching father's day tee, but i'm a procrastinator & it was hard to get done without papaeel realizing what i was posting. i suppose if you're a procrastinator like me, this is probably perfect timing!
were you aware that if you cut freezer paper down to a 8 1/2 x 11 sheet, you can put it (shiny side up) right into your printer & print on it? this is a recent discovery for me & after countless stencils i've made out of freezer paper with a regular piece of paper with the image printed on it under the freezer paper, i'm uber happy to save paper & a step!
before you print, you must decide what image it is you want on your tee. it took me a minute to decide as there were many potential tees papaeel would love. i considered a nod to one of our favorite movies, the royal tennenbaums & making a tee with royal on it for papaeel & then another with richie "the baumer" on it for babyeel (we could probably start referring to him as littlemaneel, because he is getting further & further away from being a baby). i decided i would make them matching melvins tees. we love the melvins (even littlemaneel can't resist rocking out to them whenever they're on)! we actually got to see them live last month & oddly enough got to meet king buzzo himself! there was no parking near the venue, other than at walgreens & we decided to be blatant sign ignorers & park in their lot anyway. as we were getting our tickets ready a car pulled into the lot & parked right next to us. when i looked over, i noticed the driver was none other than king buzzo! he was so gracious & even let us capture his image on camera! (yes, we could've further helped support the band by buying tees directly from them, but at $20 a pop, we decided $40 would fill our tank to get home & even pay for a late night meal, so we skipped out on the amenities)
so, pick your image & print it directly onto the dull side of your freezer paper (my image was ready to go. should you decide to use a more detailed image-such as a person, you may need to edit your image to make it black & white or use the stamp effect in photoshop). once printed, take your trusty xacto blade (mine has a swivel head, perfect for curves & details) & cut out your stencil. my original image had blocks around the letters-which i love, but made more difficult for this stencil, so i just decided to ignore those blocks & cut out the letters.
once it's completely cut out, you're ready to iron your stencil to your shirt (i jumped the gun & forgot to take pics until after i printed the first shirt-normally your stencil wouldn't have paint stains on it when it's first cut like the one shown below).
decide what colors you want your image to be. i just went with the colors the image already was (okay, so i couldn't help but make myself one too, hence the blue color shown. i made mine a different color & on a different colored tee, so as not to interfere w/the father & son matching tees). you can use fabric paint as i did, or acrylic paint. i used a foam brush for each color & brushed on an even coat. i only did one coat, but feel free to do another if you so choose.
let the paint dry completely, then remove your stencil & iron it onto your next shirt & your ready to paint your next tee! i was not able to find an exact match tee for littlemaneel, so i had a tim gunn moment & i made it work. the shirt i used for papaeel came in a pack, so i just cut up a 2nd tee to make an exact match for my little guy. i've never been one to use a pattern (except for my wedding/bridesmaid dresses) & so i just used an existing tee of H's as a pattern. i think it looks pretty decent!
here are my matching dudes! i love them! happy father's day!
