DIY Disney Shirts

I decided the girls needed special shirts. Princess birthday trip shirts and they could be the gift they open to reveal the trip. Mike decided I needed to learn how to silk screen my own shirts and bought the supplies which gave us some fun options. After a brief tutorial on how screen printing works, I knew we needed Cinderella's silhouette. I wanted it to be clear it was their birthdays and we already had their names in fun princess font too. Ready, set, shirts...

Materials

• White Shirts (I got mine at Target for $4 they had little bows on one shoulder)
• Silk Screening Kit or alternately this technique with freezer paper
• Screen Printing Ink
• Transparency Film
• T-shirt Transfer Paper
• Images you want to use & Photo editing software (we used Paintshop Pro)
• A Birthday Girl or Two!

Design

I chose the silhouette of Cinderella holding up her gown on either side to admire it. It's a great shape and totally appropriate for some little girls getting princess make-overs via fairy godmothers. I used Paintshop to make a transparent background for the silhouette. We decided to add Cinderella's mice carrying a birthday cake across the bottom. After lots of image searches I gave Mike a few good images of Cinderella's little friends and a birthday cake. He edited out the mice in appropriate positions for cake carrying and pieced together the images for the front and back of the shirt. After all that editing, Mike cut the shape of the mice running by out of the silhouette. First, he made a layer that was just the mice with contrast adjusted all the way to white with the silhouette behind them (for the transparency). Then he made a second image with just the mice in regular color for the t-shirt transfer paper.

On the back of the shirt we had each girl's name in princess font on the top and then Gus Gus holding a match next to a piece of cake with a "5" candle (that he put in backwards, oh Gus Gus). Everything except Cinderella is going to be an iron on transfer. We wanted to avoid doing the whole shirt as an iron on because they don't allow the cotton to breathe and it gets hot. Plus, silk screening, Yay! We decided to do Cinderella in a blue gradient, but I've seen lots of folks choose hot pink and it's adorable.

Print your silhouette on your transparency film. Don't forget to take the film out before you do any day to day printing. Then make a page of all your iron-on elements in Paintshop. Don't forget to reverse them so they will face the right way on the shirt! Print them out on your t-shirt transfer paper.

Making Them

First, paint a thin layer of photo emulsion on both sides of the silk screen. Allow that to dry in complete darkness overnight.

Next, cut out you're iron-on elements with as little white around them as possible. I recommend tiny sewing scissors for small details. Do not cut them apart. Leave them connected so that they are all in the same positions relative to each other. Iron on following the t-shirt transfer paper instructions. You can look at your Cinderella on the transparency as a guide to show you where to put the mice on the front of the shirt.

Then lay the transparency film on top so that the mice match their outlines and leave in strong direct light (sunlight, strong incandescent lamp, etc). The brighter the light source the shorter the time it takes. We used my Ott lamp and it took about an hour, direct mid day sunlight would have taken 25min or so. During this process the photo emulsion exposed to light is bonded together into a plastic-y substance and the emulsion shaded by the transparency film remains more chalk-like. Wash everything you can off the screen this creates your negative space. Prepare your shirt by putting something flat and smooth (not bumpy like cardboard) in between the layers of your shirt. Use something that will wipe clean if it gets inky. Mike recommends particle board.

I got four shirts, just in case and I recommend doing a test run if this is your first time. Next, place your shirt underneath the screen. Arrange your paint along one edge and then squeegee across your stencil. We used Speedball screen printing ink. We did had the paint so it went from lighter blue into darker blue towards the bottom of the gown. We mixed and marbled the inks ourselves into two cups. One with more of the darker color, the other with more of the lighter and poured them out into two blobs on paper plates. That way the paint would marble itself. Allow the shirt to dry completely.

Give them to the Birthday Princesses

Reactions!

The moms are excited too!!