Make Your Own Adventure T-Shirts
My daughter and I recently turned our spare bedroom into one big room of crafting. Sewing. painting weaving etc... So it seemed only natural that one day my husband would surprise us with a deluxe screen printing kit. Yes, it would be very easy to design and create a logo and upload it to site and have it professionally done. But where is the adventure in that? Where is the learning and exploring?
The process is not that difficult and we have highlighted some of the tasks below. The key for most of the process is working in a light-sensitive environment (which meant working late at night with a special light while prepping the screens and then exposing them with the designs. Our daughter free-hand drew the design for the shirts using a black permanent marker on the translucent film provided in the kit OR you can print a design from a computer using an ink jet printer -- lots of options.
Once you expose the design on the screen and let it cure using another special light (included in the kit) you use a garden hose to wash out the areas of the screen that were not exposed and cured (which lets the ink get onto your t-shirt). Once the screen is prepped and cured it can last as long as you want it to so you can make more shirts as you need them.
Setting up the shirt and screen for printing is easy with the kit and you can see the results from our very first print below.
There are many kits out there. We used the deluxe kit from http://diyprintshop.com which included everything you need to get started. We set up in the kitchen late at night and have created two screens so far. The most important lesson I learned was to SPELL CHECK your logo! But that's ok, perfection is boring.
Its good to get messy and try new things. Who knows, before you know it there my be AZ Field Trip Mom t-shirts for sale soon!
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