Now that it's practically May, I can finally reveal our big Christmas 2006 project! ha ha We decided to make gifts for the nieces and nephew this year and they turned out great. We've had an ongoing joke that as Aunt and Uncle we'll always be on good terms with the kids. You know, the Aunts and Uncles are always the cool ones, even when the kids get to that age where they find their parents embarassing. We're pretty happy about that. So I made a 70's inspired graphic of Dan's face that said Uncle Dan Rocks and we silkscreened it onto shirts.
I usually use oil-based ink for silkscreening, but it smells to high-heaven and it's best to use it in the studio where there's better ventilation and it doesn't matter if you spill some on the table or floor. For this project I bought a water-based ink that is especially for fabric and it was terrific. So nice to have easy clean-up for a change. First, we put chipboard inside the shirt to protect the back in case there's any ink bleed-through and also to provide a smooth surface on which to screen. I had Dan hold the screen in position while I pulled the ink through and then we let the shirts dry overnight. The next day we heat-set them with the iron so that the ink wouldn't fade when washed. It was super quick; more time went into making the graphic. Dan's not happy about it but other people have asked for t-shirts with this graphic and I'm thinking tote-bags would be cute too!
Now that it's practically May, I can finally reveal our big Christmas 2006 project! ha ha We decided to make gifts for the nieces and nephew this year and they turned out great. We've had an ongoing joke that as Aunt and Uncle we'll always be on good terms with the kids. You know, the Aunts and Uncles are always the cool ones, even when the kids get to that age where they find their parents embarassing. We're pretty happy about that. So I made a 70's inspired graphic of Dan's face that said Uncle Dan Rocks and we silkscreened it onto shirts. 
I usually use oil-based ink for silkscreening, but it smells to high-heaven and it's best to use it in the studio where there's better ventilation and it doesn't matter if you spill some on the table or floor. For this project I bought a water-based ink that is especially for fabric and it was terrific. So nice to have easy clean-up for a change. First, we put chipboard inside the shirt to protect the back in case there's any ink bleed-through and also to provide a smooth surface on which to screen. I had Dan hold the screen in position while I pulled the ink through and then we let the shirts dry overnight. The next day we heat-set them with the iron so that the ink wouldn't fade when washed. It was super quick; more time went into making the graphic. Dan's not happy about it but other people have asked for t-shirts with this graphic and I'm thinking tote-bags would be cute too!
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