Quick Fixes: T-shirt Envy

     Here's a scenario I find myself in frequently: you see a t-shirt somewhere online and think "Oooh, I want that!" then you either a) can't find it again later or b) track down where it comes from and find out it doesn't come in the size/color/material/exact font that you want. What do you do? Make your own! 

     This time around I kept seeing variations of the same idea: some shirt (long sleeve, short sleeve, white, pink, blue, what have you) with the phrase "ex-mermaid" on it in any number of fonts. This pleased me. I frequently joke that I used to be a mermaid, since that would explain the truly stupid amount of hair I have as well as my insane water consumption needs (I wake up like Spongebob in Sandy's treedome. waaaater. waaaater. Also one time in Target I picked up a bottle of water at the checkout, but the line was somewhat longish and by the time I got to the cashier I had to buy a second bottle because I'd already drank the first one. The struggle is real). And my uncanny ability to lure sailors to their deaths and collect their souls, I guess (I would not be a sweet mermaid). Anyway, I decided I'd just whip myself up a version of that theme.

     For the stencil, I downloaded a free font I liked, typed it up, then printed it and asked my mom to trace/cut it out of stencil material because I can't be trusted to not cut a finger off with an x-acto knife (I'm too shaky; like a chihuahua but more rattled). Then I just taped the corners down...

This neon paint and nail polish color actually make me look tan. What a fantastic illusion. 

     And stippled the paint straight up and down over the stencil. If you go at an angle at all you can end up getting paint under the stencil, so it's important to hold the stencil tight and your pouncer thingy straight. Then let the paint dry a bit, pull off the stencil and...

     Voila! The dark splotch up there is because I tried to ruin everything by getting a smidge of paint off the edge of the stencil. I caught it pretty quickly though, so it came out with a wet paper towel no problem. I think I'm going to roll the sleeves on the shirt (it's just a plain pale pink short sleeved oversized tee I picked up at a craft store out of a sale section. It doesn't look very pink here, but as we've seen, the neon plays tricks) and tack them so they stay up, then it'll be ready to wear!