AnneJonesArt: We're Going to Disneyland!!!

You know the old saying after a huge success . . .We're Going to Disneyland!!!

We actually are ready to go again! These pictures were five years ago but so cute . . . I had just gotten my first silhouette sd and Making their outfits were my obsession. Truth be told that these were harder that is looked in the pinterest pages . . . .

So my daughter and son in law live is Southern CA and their two children are the perfect age for our first outing to Disneyland. It was inspired by the adorable shirts I bought from Haley Rice @ Matchin Me. She has been my inspiration for making my own shirts for all of us to wear.

I started out with their theme: Happiest Place on EARTH! I used my Silhouette
to cut out the letters and the Mickey Ears . . . . I have had my Silhouette a year now and the learning curve is ongoing. This machine does so much but learning to draw my own designs has taken patients and a few calls and emails to their help line. I was having trouble with the overlapping circles cutting through each other so by clicking on the end points as they suggested I was able to adjust them to the outer larger circle. Making them all one design.

For the Mickey Ears I could not find the famous polk a dots black and white that I wanted so settled on this music note fabric I found I ironed WonderUnder fabric fusible lining to the back and then cut them out using the silhouette. I had previously pre washed all the fabric, the shirts I removed the pockets that were on them, and after the washing you could not tell there was a pocket. One of the shirts must have been sewn with industrial strength thread and as careful as I was I created a hole so off-set Mickey's Head in a different design (can you tell which one??) After ironing on the Heads . . . I then went to my sewing machine and zig zagged all around the Mickey design to make sure they were attached and would withstand the ruff tough play of children.

Creating the lettering for the shirt I arranged the "Happiest Place On "
around a circle. From the Silhouette tool bar I drew a circle larger than Mickeys Ear
then selecting the Font tool and setting the font to Apple Chancery I typed one letter at a time arranging them around the circle . . . then spelt out EARTH below using BLACKOAK . . . I really wish I would have put an EXCLAMATION POINT! Darn it! Learn by doing . . . .

Then once you have the lettering the way you want it - click on the circle and hit the delete key so the circle is gone but your letters are still rounded (see example) then with the selection tool, and draw a big square around all the letters, remember all the letters around your circle are individual so the entire design must be grouped. So after selecting all, it will be highlighted then the menu at the top that says OBJECT pull down and click on Group once this is done click on it again and the whole design will be highlighted, then you will see a green dot handle on the top center by grabbing this you can rotate the design around and as you see below. After you rotate the design grab a corner point and resize to fit the new direction. Still keeping the design highlighted copy / paste to create two designs. Now you can cut two at a time saving you wasted Heat Transfer material. Waste not want not! Ok, there is one more step if you look closely at the photo below you can tell I reversed the image. This is done by going to you Object Menu at the top again and the first choice is Transform > and then >
Flip Horizontally. This reverses the type so when you iron it on it will come out readable. Yikes this is vitally important . . . .

The heat transfer lettering I bought as a starter kit from silhouette and it was a great way to begin because they give you a plethora of colors to start with so you know how to order next time. Basically Heat Transfer Material tutorial will give you an idea how this material works.