Glittery Deer Sweatshirt

Morgan and I have called each other "Deer" for years and years. I remember that it started one night when we were younger, very late at night, and we were coming up with a story or something. We nicknamed each other "Little Debbie" and "Deer" and I couldn't tell you why exactly if my life depended upon it. All I know is that we forgot who was who and over time have just called each other "Deer". Our letters and birthday greetings and texts usually include a reference to this nickname, and when putting pictures on Instagram, Morgan created a hashtag with "Deer cousins" in the title. 

Thus, the great need for deer related paraphernalia. This craft turned out to be easier than expected and better looking than we hoped, and I now have my eye on other things to stencil. 

You'll Need:

Freezer Paper (it's in the aisle with foil and plastic wrap)

Paint (you can use fabric paint, but we used textile medium with acrylic glitter paint)

Sweatshirt or shirt

X-Acto knife

Cutting board (learned the hard way)

Iron

Paper, Pen, Patience

To start, trace an image you like onto printer paper. I Googled "deer outline" and found an image we both liked, then increased the zoom until we liked the size. Since we were making two shirts, I went ahead and traced the image twice, one backward for a little variation.

Then put the printer paper under a sheet of freezer paper and cut out your shape with the X acto knife. I made the brilliant mistake of not using a cutting board and now I have a deer etched into the pine of our coffee table. Carson said "Cool!" when he saw it, but still, don't do that.

Try your shirt on and figure out where you want the shape to go. This was important because we thought we liked it a certain way, but our bulky sweatshirts wouldn't have looked good if we'd gone through with it. We used a clothespin on the hem of the shirt to show where we wanted the leg of the deer to go.

Set the freezer paper stencil on the shirt shiny side down, making sure both shirt layers are smoothed out, and iron on low. You want the edges to be very secure.

 Mix one part textile medium to two parts acrylic paint, and paint away! We did two coats before we were satisfied, but could easily have done a third.

Wait till it's dry or mostly dry and carefully peel away the freezer paper. We were amazed that there was zero bleeding around the edges! I think I ironed too much and that was a good thing.

Once it's fully dry, put a cloth over your image and iron. You can wear it whenever, but don't wash for 5-7 days to make sure it's set.

I have a plain sweater and some pillows that I think I'm going to try this out on very soon!