Sewing Project-Appliqué

My sweet friend Erica has two precious little girls.  Both girls have birthdays coming up in the next couple weeks.  In honor of their birthday I decided to test my newly discovered sewing skills on something a little fancier than pillows.  

Here is my version of an appliqu é t-shirt tutorial...

First find the picture you would like to turn into an appliqué.  I found a super cute cupcake on clipart, made it the size I wanted for the shirt, printed it off and cut it out. 

 Pin each piece of the clipart to material and cut it out.

Next I used some fusible interfacing to make each piece a little stiffer.  This step is not necessarily needed, but it does help to keep the pieces in place better when sewing to the shirt.

I began by pinning the interfacing to the back of each piece of fabric and steam ironing them.  Trim edges of interfacing once the fabric has become fused to the material and cooled.

 Pin each piece of the fabric to the shirt and your are ready to start sewing.

For attaching the cupcake to the shirt, I used a zig-zag stitch around each piece.  My machine already chooses the length and width of my stitches, but I tweeked the numbers a little bit and made the zig-zags a closer together for a tighter look.

As a finishing touch I hand-sewed glass beads to the polka dots for an extra touch.

The shirts came out really cute and I was very impressed!  It really wasn't a difficult task once I got started.  The hardest part was picking out cute material!

I found this tutorial online, which is what I based my appliqué process on...I just changed a few things.  She has a TON of cute projects and tutorials on her blog that I just love!  This site is also where I got my inspiration for the burlap fall wreath. I'm hoping to try more stuff out this summer when I have a little more time on my hands.