How I hacked my Cricut

I was so very excited when I purchased my cricut.  I got it last summer after drooling over it during middle-of-the-night-baby-feeding infomercials.  After about five minutes of watching that infomercial I walk away wondering how any self-respecting mother can possibly exist without a cricut at their disposal.  I mean, the possibilities!  Oh the possibilities!  And keep in mind, I am not a scrapbooker.  I want my house covered in Vinyl quotes and fun, seasonal decorations.
And in fairness, I've used the cricut a fair amount.  I've cut fabric, made cards, made birthday party decorations, gift tags, bin labels... the list goes on.
Now though, I'm frustrated.  The designs on cricut cartridges are too complex for my needs (most of the time).  And I have a vision for a few projects that I'm working on that are specific and the cricut just isn't cutting it (pun fantastically intended).
So tonight I rang the bell.
It was time to turn to Sure Cuts A Lot.
It was a little tricky because we are a Linux family and SCAL requires Windows or Mac.  Luckily I do have one laptop with a Windows partition (allowing me to access I-Tunes when necessary).  I had to do a lot of updating... usb driver updating twice as well as two firmware updates for my cricut but now I have the freedom to cut out exactly what I want.  FREEDOM.  If I want to fill my entire cutting mat with one letter I CAN!  Hooray!!  No more $50 cartridges that fill only specific roles.  FREEDOM!!
  Of course, now that it's done it's midnight so hopefully tomorrow I can play with fonts and svg files and get these projects done!

In which: I join the freezer paper bandwagon

I've had my eye on doing freezer paper t-shirts for a while.
I first saw the technique on MADE and fell instantly in love. Little Bit Funky is in on the freezer paper action as well. It's the perfect project because it's fast, simple, inexpensive and has near-instant gratification.
So here we go:
Freezer Paper shirts Julianna style!

First the freezer paper.

I bought a big roll of it at Target. It's in the same section as the tin foil and plastic wrap. I had to hunt for it a little
I cut the shape out using my cricut and the Wild Card cartridge. I wanted to make a Valentine's shirt so I found a card element that was "Valentiney." I put the freezer paper right on my Cricut cutting mat and cut away.
When peeling your paper off your mat remember that you're painting in the negative space so save any small dots for eyes and inner parts.

Next: iron the paper to your shirt (shiny side down)



It's time to paint! I chose a matte fabric paint (did you know they actually still sell puff paint? It's like 1988 all over again!) and used a sponge brush and applied a thick coat.

Put something in the shirt to keep the paint from bleeding to the other side. I used a paper grocery bag. I save tons of those paper bags thinking they might come in handy. And look! They did!
Let the paint dry then peel off the paper.
Iron over the paint to set it. DO NOT IRON ON IT DIRECTLY. COVER THE PAINT WITH ANOTHER CLOTH FIRST.

And there you have it... a fantastic custom shirt!  It looks even cuter on our model!

This is Grant's Valentine Ella.  Her mommy blogs over here.

I purchased all of my supplies at Hobby Lobby. The shirts were less than $3 as was a tube of paint which will last for a really long time.
I'm super excited to do custom shirts, bags, hats, etc using this technique because it's simple and fun.