It's a funny story. I actually ran out of black thread and went to a Wal-mart in another town not-so-near us to pick up some. (We don't have any place near us that sells sewing notions.) Of course, they were completely out of black thread. (Had every bizarre color you could ever want in all types, but no black! grumble, grumble! ) But as I shuffled away grumbling, I spotted a bolt of black light weight linen blend fabric in the bargain shelf (you know the one where they put a pile of bolts for $1-2 yd with no labels so you get to guess what it is?). I decided to buy up the 6 yds to make a chemise and/or shirt for $1.50 a yard. Then, I was also inspired and thought it would make a perfect flag for with a friend's new pirate insignia on it.
I traced mirror images of the design on two stencils made from freezer paper to get the design on both sides. I added dots to the corners of the stencil image before I printed it. This way I was able to poke a flat-headed pin through the layers to align the stencils. The freezer paper stencils are ironed on one at a time. Though it was time consuming cutting out the stencils, it worked really well with the acrylic paint.
My mom assisted in drawing the design for him. Here is one of the images that she drew:
In case you're wondering, I did happened upon a spool of black thread on the way home at our local thrift, which helped me to get the last minute flag done in time. I tried out the new vintage ziz-zag machine with it. So, I zig-zagged the hem instead of rolling it to keep it supple. I sewed the stitches 1/2" in from the edge; trimmed down to 1/4"; and frayed the edges by pulling out the threads.
For the casing, I used some scrap canvas along with some grommets I had around. You never know when you will need something, right? I keep EVERYTHING, you know!!
Now to get to making the chemise/shirt!
Oh I love it! It turned out great!! How fun!!
ReplyDeleteJamie
Thanks! I'm just glad he likes it. He's displaying it at his bar.
ReplyDeleteMieljolie