One of the items my four year old and I made in the holidays was this T-shirt! It was a great little project to involve him in and he now loves wearing his new t-shirt, he even managed to dig out a pair of shorts with cars on to match.

large t-shirt to cut up

I had previously drafted my own t-shirt block for James’ age which was very exciting for me as it was my first block/pattern. I was testing it out on this project.
We started off with a cheap t-shirt of mine that I hadn’t worn and probably was unlikely to wear. We cut out the fabric from my t-shirt using the new pattern.

Cutting t-shirt from pattern

We wanted to print something on the t-shirt. After umming and ahhhhhing I decided on using a stamp print, thinking it would be easier than screen printing.
Luckily amongst my arty supplies I had some lino and a lino cutter, we decided together on using a car for the design, drew the car on the lino thinking about the negative spaces that we needed and cut away the bits we didn’t want the paint to stick to.

Then very free hand, together we sponged the paint onto the lino cut and printed onto the front of the t-shirt. We just printed the front piece and printed one little car on the back piece. The paint we used was a mix of normal acrylic paint and a textile medium for screen printing on fabric. I’m not sure yet how long the print will last with multiple washes, we will see. I think next time I’m going to research fabric paint.

printing on the t-shirt front

sponging the stamp for james to print

printed car front along with a few splodges

Using my overlocker I sewed it all together (after being nagged quite a lot by James!). I had cheated slightly as I had lined the pattern pieces up so I could utilise the original hem line. This made sewing it up quicker. I first sewed the shoulders, then sewed on the sleeves, cut a neckband from the same fabric smaller than the neckline, pinned in place and overlocked around the neckline stretching the band out as I sewed. Then sewed down the sides including the sleeves. I used my new coverstitch machine (still learning how to use this!) round the neckline to finish it off. Of course you can sew all this on a normal sewing machine using a stretch stitch or what I used to use was a zig zag stitch. Also attached a little pocket as I thought it would look cute and it covered up a little splodge!

overlocked shoulders and sleeves

neckline before it was coverstitched using a band of the same fabric

I’m very happy with how this project has turned out and so is James! We will be doing more! Its something I’ve wanted to try out for ages, making my own pattern, printing a design and constructing the garment. I’m now on the hunt for a sustainable and organic supply of fabric! Also Fabric paint if anyone has any ideas, for paint or fabric?