4th of July Shirts

I know, there’s only a few days until the 4th of July this weekend.

But here’s a fun little project you can do last minute.

And pretty quickly.

Little 4th of July shirts.

Then I decided how wide I wanted to make the flag (about 6 1/2 inches wide) and placed pins at each side.   Then I layed the strips down, just how I wanted them from the left side, and let the tails hang over the right side for now.

Then I made a pencil mark at the left side of each strip and the right side of each strip, 1/4 inch down from the top of the strip (so the line would be centered down the center of each strip).  And then I made a straight line with my pencil.  

I did that for each strip so I would know exactly where to lay each strip after I ruffled them.  Make sure your pencil lines are exactly as long and spaced exactly how you’d like it……so that placing the ruffles will be easier.

Then make a basting stitch down the center of each 13 inch strips and gather them so that they are only 6 1/2 inches wide (because that’s how wide my flag is).  Pin each ruffle in place, directly over top each pencil mark.  (And I ended up trimming about 2 inches off the ends of the top two ruffles because they were more ruffly from being gathered more to fit a smaller space.  Make sense?  If not, just ignore.) 

Then sew each ruffle in place.

Then I cut a blue knit square (again, from an old tshirt scrap) and sewed it right to the shirt.  Then I sewed five little buttons onto the square.

Onto the more plain flag. 

I first ironed on some Heat ‘n Bond (double sided adhesive) to a big chunk of the red knit. (from the old red tshirt I used above, remember?)  From that, I cut strips of red that were 1/2 x 6 inches.  

(See the paper backing of the adhesive on one side and the knit on the other side?)

Then I peeled off all of the paper backing and layed each strip on the front of the shirt.

I added some Heat ‘n Bond iron on adhesive to a little blue square as well, and placed everything just where I wanted it.

I also attached some of the same Heat ‘n Bond to the back of a white square of fabric (it was actually the pocket that I picked off the shirt), then traced some stars onto the paper backing of the adhesive, cut them out, then added them to the blue square.  Then I ironed everything in place.

Then I stitched around everything…

Nice and quick.

And pretty inexpensive.  And yes, I know you can buy little flag shirts everywhere for about $5…….but they aren’t nearly as cute/fun as making your own.