Christmas Tree Shirt - My First!

As long as I have had a Cricut, I am just now starting to explore what it can cut besides paper. I took my first foray into vinyl this year (love that stuff!) and now I have tried fabric! Man was this easy!!!! I have been wanting to do this for a while but I have to admit - I was a little intimidated. But I saw this idea and knew this was my opportunity to try it out.

Most of you know that I have a Gypsy. I knew I wanted to put a tree on my shirt so I searched on my G for the perfect tree. I ended up finding what I wanted on the Create A Critter cartridge under Accessories. I made it about 8.5" wide and 7" tall to fit an XL t-shirt I picked up at Target.

Before I cut the fabric, I ironed it to get any wrinkles out. I had seen a video on YouTube about using Steam-A-Seam 2 as the fusable mesh (click here for video) so I ironed that to backside of the fabric. I cut my piece out and adhered it to my Cricut Mat with the right side of the fabric down (very important!). I then cut out my tree. I used Multicut x3 to ensure that my project came out as clean as possible.

**IMPORTANT** Because I used an image that was symmetrical, I didn't have have to flip my image around. But if you want to cut words or an image that is not symmetrical, you will have to flip your image with DS or the G. Otherwise, your words will be cut backwards since the fabric is facing the mat.

Once my image was cut, I ironed my image on my shirt following the iron setting recommendations of the Steam-a-Seam. It worked like a charm! I then ironed some Tulip iron-on bling (I have to have bling on most everything) on the tree to make it sparkle. I then decided to make a ribbon tree topper so I just ran a stich along the edge of a piece of double-faced satin ribbon and pulled the string tauwt. I then stiched it all together to make a kind of ball shape. I stiched that to the shirt and it was complete. I wore it to a charity event and got lots of compliments on it. Here are some closeup pics.

Thanks for looking and have a Merry Christmas!

Smooches,