Know your culture, know yourself! It’s always a great idea to celebrate and be a shining example 24/7/365 of your heritage! That was the inspiration behind this Coat of Arms T-shirt DIY that you can custom make. I’m third-generation Mexican-American and love hearing stories from my family about my great-grandparents living in Zacatecas and Sonora, Mexico. And those of my grandparents and parents carrying those traditions over to this very day right here in Phoenix, Arizona! I think they would approve of the glitter…
I used the coat of arms symbol, but you can use whatever you want – there are so many cool images to choose from!
SUPPLIES:
1 T-shirt
Printable fabric sheets, iron-on (See image above. You can buy a pack at the craft store in the fashion art aisle. They are sheets of cotton fabric with a paper backing that you can run through your printer, then remove the backing and iron on)
Home printer (I used the HP Envy 5660)
Fabric adhesive in a bottle with a fine tip
Fabric glitter in assorted colors
Assorted sizes of flat-backed crystals, crayon or tweezers to pick them up
Iron
Sheet of printer paper
Cardboard insert
Directions:
Prewash your shirt to remove sizing, hang dry.
Open your chosen image in a photo editing program (I used PicMonkey.com), and enlarge to fill 8×10. Make sure to use a high-resolution image. You can find these online. Look for at least 2000 pixels wide.
Insert the sheet of paper-backed fabric into the printer, face down. Print. Iron onto the front of the shirt.
Use pinking shears to cut out the design, then iron it to your shirt.
Time to add the glitter!
Use the fine tip bottle to apply the adhesive. Start with one color at a time, working from the largest areas first. Apply the glue.
Pour the specific color of glitter over the wet glue. Pour or sprinkle the glitter over the wet glue. Carefully pick up the shirt and tip it over a sheet of paper to catch the overflow glitter. Pour the extra glitter back in the jar. Now move on to the second color and repeat the process. After that, do the other colors, one at a time.
Keep going until you have all the glittered you want and need to make it look flashy and fun!
Now you want to finish off the edges, how about some crystals? Add drops of adhesive around the outside area of the design and use a crayon to pick up and drop the flat-backed crystals in place.
And let it all dry and you are good to go!
For more Hispanic Heritage Month T-shirt ideas, check out my feature in the current issue of Cosmo for Latinas – on newsstands now!
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