The post that will make you popular with all your friendsJuly 23rd, 2007 @ 7:01 am
I know I’ve been talking it up for a while now. But believe you me, this post was worth the wait. Or at least I think it is.
You probably don’t know it but my best friend, May (not her real name) is a very talented designer and illustrator. Very talented. So talented, in fact, that she may or may not do illustrations for the magazine favored by dentists the world over that rhymes with Bighlights.
May is also friends in real life with the beloved DesignMom. They went to college together and are such good friends that DesignMom hired May to do all of her kid’s birth announcements.
For years May has helped me become a better crafter. We’re not talking about the pretty little scrapbooks and pre-made items like that. May is pretty clever and comes up with her own projects. All of which are amazing.
A few years ago when everybody we knew started having kids and we were attending a few baby showers every month, May came up with The Best Baby Shower Gift in the History of the World. Since May is moving away to Reno, I was afraid this talent of hers would move with her. I begged her to show me her ways. She agreed, and this “How-To” post was born.
Let’s turn the time over to my bestest friend, May:
—————–
How To Win the Baby Shower Gift Competition (yes, they’re judging you…)
I like to give unique gifts. If you’ve got lots of cash laying around, there are TONS of great things to buy out there (ever visited designmom? Totally awesome). Alas, I am poor. But I’m not going to let it stop me from being fabulous… And in the spirit of cheap-skates everywhere I now impart my crafting knowledge to you so you can also win that baby shower & amaze your friends, the church ladies, and the mom-to-be with your crafty skillz.
Lots of stores sell awesome onesies with band names for lots of money (Cinder Block, or that embarrassing store in the mall where the goth kids go….Hot Topic, etc.). But if you are willing to spend some time on images.google.com, and can work Photoshop, you can make some rockin’ onesies for only a few bucks. And even if you can’t work Photoshop, I’m going to give you some FREE designs here to cut & paste into your program of choice.
A quick lesson on copyright laws –
Most the stuff you find on the internet is not free game. Someone owns the rights to the images. You can’t just take Jordan Catalano’s picture & start selling millions of onesies dedicated to his hotness, no matter what the market demands. I’m just sayin’, you can’t sell these puppies…
Supplies & My Lengthy Explanation of Said Supplies:
Onesies – I’ve gotten totally awesome onesies at thrift stores before (vintage stripes, hand stiched necklines, etc.) Don’t pay more than $.50/each for them, and obviously wash them well before ironing on…
The “Circo” brand at Target sells a 5-pack for around $10 which are pretty great. I don’t personally like the “Gerber” onesies because they’re just surged on the edges & look slightly ghetto. Ross sells cute striped onesies in a 5-pack for about $8 too. If you’re really into making onesis, you can get them in bulk (and cool colors) from Anvil (for kids T’s) or American Apparel (a tad pricey, but GREAT quality).
Iron On Paper* – My favorite is the Epson brand (it’s cheapest at amazon). But I have an Epson printer. I’ve also had good luck with Office Depot’s generic brand. As long as you follow the directions, they’re all pretty good. And most babies are only wearing them for a few months anyway…
* These directions are for regular iron-on paper, to be used with white or light colored fabric. If you want to do black or dark colors, you’ll need to get different paper & follow the directions.
Ink Jet Printer – I’m pretty sure you need to print them via ink jet. Check your iron on directions to see for sure.
Photoshop – These directions are for Photoshop CS, but you can lay it out in whatever program you want. Just be sure to flip the image so that it prints backwards before you print.
Iron
Wooden Cutting Board
Designing Your Onesie
This is my favorite part. I like to start at images.google.com and type in random 80’s bands, famous body builders, tattoo designs, politicians, etc. (I mean, doesn’t every baby need a shirt with Whitney Houston on it that says, “Crack Is Whack”? Crack IS whack….) Look for medium to large sized files if you can. I am going to look up Jordan Catalano.
-Open Photoshop.
-Once you find your dreamy picture of Jordan, click on the link at the top of images.google.com that says, “See full-size image”.
-Move your mouse a’top the image & right-click. Choose “Copy Image”.
-In Photoshop select File, New File, “OK” (it should automatically be the same size as the image you just copied. Thank you Photoshop!)
-Select Edit, Paste.
-I use the brush tool to white out the background & clean up the image, but it’s up to you.
-If you have a smallish image, change the canvas size to the size you want your image to be (3”x3” is good for a onesie). Go to Image, Canvas Size, (fill in the size you want). Then go to edit, transform, scale to make it fit the canvas size. Hold the “Shift” button while you scale the image to keep the proportions correct.
-If you have a largish image, go to Image, Image Size & cut it down to 3”wide x whatever” tall.
-If the image is bitmapped or grainy- you can add some cool filters. My favorite is the halftone screen:
-Select Image, Mode, Grayscale to make the image black & white.
-Select Filter, Sketch, Halftone pattern & select how far you want to push the pattern. (I usually come back with the brush tool now & take out all the extra dots that showed up in the plain white background when the halftone pattern was applied.)
-Add type, if you want to add some snarky comment. (Of course this is not required. Jordan can stand on his own. We are adding some Tragic Love Friday text. You know, because we can.)
-Select the color you want the type to be from the “Swatches” window -Select the “T” (type) tool.
-When you click the type tool onto your image, the top bar of the photoshop screen will show the type choices & sizes you have. Go at LEAST 20pt size. And go crazy…
-You may need to make your canvas size larger to fit the type. Go back to Image, Canvas Size, and add the inch that you need (and where you’d like it to be added on the image).
-In Photoshop CS you can edit the type after you’ve clicked off it, but it’s a little tricky. It may try to add new type on a different layer. Click DIRECTLY on top of what you’ve already put in & you can select it to change the font & font size.
-Once type is set & happy, flatten the image. Go to the “Layers” window & select the little arrow right underneath the red “x”. Select “Flatten Image”.
-Now we need to flip it so it will print backwards. Go to Select, Select All. Then go to Edit, Transform, Flip Horizontal.
-I try to fill up a whole page with designs before I print so that I don’t waste my valuable iron-on paper printing one little 3” design. I can get up to 10 designs on a page (if some are small).
-To do this, change your canvas size to just slightly smaller than the iron on paper size. Go to Image, Canvas Size, & change to 8×10”.
-Now you can either copy & paste the current design, or start all over & make new ones to add!. Hooray for photoshop!!!
-To copy the same design, use the dotted-square select tool (AKA Rectangular Marquee Tool) from the toolbar & select your image.
-Go to Edit, Copy.
-Go to Edit, Paste.
-Choose the arrow tool (AKA “Move Tool”, right next to the dotted square select tool) to move the pasted image to it’s new home (it usually pastes the new image DIRECTLY on top of the old image, so you have to move it to see that it’s there). Now you are ready to print!!!
-Follow the printing directions that came with your paper (to see how to load it, etc). Just make sure you print on the right side (otherwise it will make a mess on your iron & you will say bad words).
-Once everything is printed, heat up your iron nice & hot. NO STEAM! Lay your onesie out on your handy-dandy cutting board.
-Cut out the designs, leaving a little extra border of plain iron-on paper around all them (otherwise it can smear when you’re ironing) You only need to leave 1/8 – 1/16th of an inch.
-Be careful where you place it, make sure it’s in the middle of the onesie. I know that’s obvious, but it’s amazing how many of mine end up kind of skewed.
-Keep the iron moving so you don’t singe the image or fabric, but make sure it’s TOTALLY ADHERED to the fabric before you stop applying heat. And don’t be afraid to press down hard! It will take longer than you’re expecting. Don’t get scared.
-Make sure it’s totally cooled before you peel the paper off. If the paper is sticking to the image STOP & iron it again. That means it wasn’t ironed on all the way.
-Now peel off the paper.
-Stand back & admire your cute, crafty self. YOU ROCK! This is the big payoff!!!
(Our very awesome Tragic Love Friday inspired design. Which will be hand-delivered to the lovely Frema this week at BlogHer.)
-Prepare to amaze friends & family. I like to get little cotton pants to go with the onesies & make it a complete outfit. I’ve done striped pants with a jolly-roger pirate onesie for a pirate-themed outfit, a flaming AC/DC onesie with bright orange pants, or little baby jeans with random band onesies (as per the mom-to-be’s obsession, be it Battlestar Galactica or Rhett Miller). And since they’re so cheap to make, you can give away 5 at a time without breaking the bank. Hooray!!!
(Some of the stash that May and Isabel put together in preparing for this post.)
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As promised I have a few of May’s designs that she is happy to share with you. They are reversed and ready for your added snarky comments or left as-is.
(For more of May’s FREE designs, visit my flickr page.)

(The King is convinced I should make one of these and send it to Rhett. I don’t know what he would think of it. The word “stalker” comes to mind.)
I can’t wait to see what you come up with.
They're just my friends · Guest posts · How-To's

Frema
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:01 pm
Oh my gosh, I am laughing so hard. I LOVE the onesie and the directions on how to make my own. May and Isabel, this post rocked the house. Many thanks for sharing your wisdom!
(And seriously, I cannot wait to put that onesie on Freka. So Awesome.)
Brittany
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:24 pm
I tried this once in college and I totally screwed it up. Maybe I need to try again.
Carrisa
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:34 pm
This is the best post ever. I’m totally linking to this.
MK
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:35 pm
Those onsies are so dang cute!!!!
I will e-mail you about our ny trip soon! Still trying to get caught up on life.
Durga
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:41 pm
That’s such a great post. Michael makes his own t-shirts that way….well he’s made two so far.
I’m going to try this soon. But kids clothes r so much more expensive than discribed by May…onesie’s 5 for $10!?!! omgoodness…that’s soooooooooo cheap!
Plus u like Pirates? I love Pirates stuff for lil boys! Did u like the red pirates t i got Babboo?
Pirates r the coolest…though some ppl at church disagree. *sigh*
» I have the coolest friends
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:48 pm
[…] You all know Isabel right? I think I’ve gushed about her enough on this blog that you should. Well check out her post today. She teaches you how to make awesome iron on baby onesies (or t-shirts). It’s really quite awesome. She even made one for me. […]
Hilary
said,
July 23, 2007 at 3:52 pm
One day, one day, I am so trying this. How fun. And the TLF onesie? Awesome! And that you get to hand deliver it to Frema THIS weekend? Like, totally awesome.
May and Isabel, you both rock the house. Thank you so much for this.
Lisa B
said,
July 23, 2007 at 4:50 pm
THis is the COOLEST IDEA EVER!
Oh and send him a shirt with a pic of YOu on it that says, “I’m HER biggest fan” or something like tha — being that he knows you now. heehee.
Or some sort of Holaisabel.com t-shirt. That would be so awesome then you could get a pic of him wearing it to post on your blog!
slackermommy
said,
July 23, 2007 at 6:21 pm
Those are great! Thanks for sharing.
HollowSquirrel
said,
July 23, 2007 at 6:27 pm
AWESOME!
Whiskeymarie
said,
July 23, 2007 at 6:44 pm
What a great idea!
My husband has done this with t-shirts for himself, with mixed results.
I love crafty stuff like this!
Molly
said,
July 23, 2007 at 7:59 pm
How cool is that?! Going to try it, for sure.
SJ
said,
July 23, 2007 at 9:01 pm
Whoa, what a great post!
Those are some great onsies too by the way…I’m totally going to try this.
Thanks so much for sharing, I’m totally inspired!
Steph
said,
July 23, 2007 at 9:58 pm
Those are great! I’m going to be looking for some images tonight. I wanted to get some really snarky ones for my friend’s twins, but I haven’t been able to find them. I will just make my own! I’m so excited. I won the baby gift competition at her shower - my sister is quite the quilter and she is making a memory quilt, where everyone writes something on a quilt square and the she sews them together. My sister (she is so crafty) also made her own version of the diaper valet. Why didn’t I get that talent??
metalia
said,
July 24, 2007 at 1:57 am
AWESOME idea. Thanks, Isabel and May! Ah, Jordan Catalano…*swoon* (Too bad he’s a big douchebag in real life.)
Lizzy
said,
July 24, 2007 at 3:27 am
OMG.
There are no words. Except: WILL YOU MAKE ONE FOR HENRY, TOO?!
Only, not so much with Jordan C.
Come to think of it, both Jared Leto AND Clare Danes turned out to be total douchebags in real life. Interesting…
kerrianne
said,
July 24, 2007 at 4:07 am
I totally want a onesie that says “A Pirate’s Life For Me.” And ha! Now I can make one. Awesome.
(These are great, Is. You are so stinking creative.)
Amy W
said,
July 24, 2007 at 12:14 pm
How cool…although I would probably screw it up as well…
janet
said,
July 24, 2007 at 5:00 pm
this is such a great post! I really need to start making these, as I think the next few years there might be a baby boom among my friends.
Rachel
said,
July 24, 2007 at 8:18 pm
Those are so cute!! Love the idea!!!
Emily
said,
July 25, 2007 at 4:23 pm
Wow, very cool idea. Mental note - must become more crafty.
Audrey
said,
July 27, 2007 at 9:50 pm
This is such a great baby shower gift idea! Love it.
Maranda
said,
August 6, 2007 at 7:56 pm
Hello,
I tried making some of the onesies and when I put them on my baby, the iron-on paper cracked. I was just wondering if this is normal or could it have been the brand of paper and onesies I used? I did use Gerber onesies because I had a stockpile of them. I used Avery brand paper. Any suggestions or help is greatly appreciated! Thanks!
hola, isabel » Blog Archive » The act of ventriloquism is called “ventriloquizing”. And now you know.
said,
August 23, 2007 at 6:58 pm
[…] That’s right, iron-on onesies! […]
hola, isabel » Blog Archive » If there is a blank piece of fabric in the house, it is now covered with an iron-on
said,
October 18, 2007 at 4:16 pm
[…] Ever since my friend May showed us all how to make iron-ons, I’ve been going a little crazy with them. And by crazy, I mean by this time next year everyone from the internet will be sporting some sort of Isabel original (stolen image) iron-on. […]
Sangria Lover » Archive » All the Cuteness with None of the Responsibility? Count Me In!
said,
March 24, 2008 at 9:07 pm
[…] The spoiling of this baby, by the way, has already begun. As soon as Saturday’s celebratory dinner was planned, I searched Isabel’s archives for a specific post, sneakily found out some of my sister-in-law’s favorite things, nearly died of the cuteness in Target’s baby section, and enlisted Tim for design help. Then I gathered my materials and set to work. […]
Slow to anger? | hola, isabel
said,
April 16, 2008 at 7:26 pm
[…] In order for me to be slower to anger, I need to remind myself of this commitment. When I feel my ears heating up and my throat closing, I must remind myself…slow to anger. I thought about making a sign that says “Slow to Anger” and hanging it in my cubicle, and in my kitchen. And maybe above my bed. Heck, maybe I should make an iron-on that I can wear everyday. […]
In which I show you how to make awesome Mothers Day gifts for cheap | hola, isabel
said,
April 25, 2008 at 4:31 pm
[…] When I’ve found myself in this gift-buying predicament before, I simply relied on the craft knowledge of my bestest friend May. But um, since May deserted me moved to Reno, I’ve been on my own in the make-your-own-gift category. But whatever, I knew I needed to move past that. I asked myself, “what would May do?” […]