What you do in your house is worth as much as if you did it up in heaven for our Lord God. We should accustom ourselves to think of our position and work as sacred and well-pleasing to God, not on account of the position and work, but on account of the word and faith from which the obedience and the work flow. ~ Martin Luther

Monday, May 30, 2011

Freezer Paper Stencil Tutorial and my 'Lil Assistant


Freezer paper stenciling. Have you ever tried it?

It is GREAT fun. Super simple. Customizable. And cheap. (There, I said it.) Not to mention, kids are fabulous at it because they can paint right outside the lines and it will still be perfect. My Corynn has made many a freezer paper stencil gift in her day. And she is only 7.

I saw this awesome Assistant shirt on Pinterest a while ago and pinned it for a rainy day. Or in this case, a rainy week.

It just screams REBECCA, does it not?



I just happened to have a few plain white shirts that would work wonderfully for it, so no trips to the store for me.
All you need is some freezer paper (it is shiny on one side), acrylic paint (it is permanent) and fabric to paint. Oh-and an exacto knife sure comes in handy too.



I start out cutting a rectangle of freezer paper to iron onto the INSIDE of my shirt. This protects the back of the shirt from soaking up paint. Iron it shiny side up to the underside of the shirt front. Use your cotton setting and hold for approx. 15 seconds or until the paper has stuck on.


Next, cut out your design. I freehanded mine but you can trace or print out designs too.


Be sure to save those little pieces from the inside of your design-you'll be needing those!


Iron your stencil onto the front side of your shirt, shiny side down for 15 seconds. The heat adheres the shiny side to the fabric until you gently pull it apart. Position any small pieces from the inside of your design and iron them down too.


Now you are ready to paint~


Paint your design using acrylic paint or fabric paint. (It may take a few coats to really coat well.) Let dry.


Once dry, you can pull the freezer paper carefully away from the design. (It peels right off.) This is the fun part, I think. If your design has little pieces, tweezers may help pull them up.



Set the design with an iron by ironing for 20 seconds again.

I also added words to the shirt, so I quickly cut out a paper box template just so my letters would be uniform. I used fabric paint for this, making it super easy.



And TA-DA! You are done and your 'lil assistant is properly uniformed. ;-)



Oh Happy Day!


6 comments:

Bonnie said...

Yeah, freezer paper stenciling can get addicting. I did maryjanes on onsies for a friend who had twin girls- so cute! Wish I'd thought to take a picture...

Bonnie said...

Toofers! I just noticed! My JB has been making good use of his lil' choppers.

ulli said...

Great job on the shirt! And your Assistant is adorable!!

Unknown said...

Great job! I love it! I have heard of this before but never seen a tutorial! :) Thanks!

Bill & Stacy said...

Definately going to try this. You got me hooked. I am now on pinterest!

Abigail said...

So cute! You should use this boy when you begin YOUR business.

I did a freezer paper stencil on a Christmas gift for my mom-in-law this year. It was the first (and so far only) time I'd done it, and it was so much fun! I need to buy an exacto knife, though. Using scissors just didn't cut it. (Forgive the pun. I was halfway through the sentence before I realized where the train was heading, and by then it was too late to stop the wreck.)