June 4, 2013
9 Comments

DIY Cat Stamp Cardigan

YES! CAT STUFF!! If you’ve been depressed lately because my “You’ve Got To Be Kitten Me” archive isn’t filling up quite as fast as you had hoped, then get in line because it only takes two people to make a line. Me and you. That’s who’s in the line. There are some pretty adorable DIY animal prints out there (like this cutie), but there can always be more cat themed merchandise, and when I can’t find exactly what I want, I usually try to make my own.

 

I took a white cardigan that I was bored with and dyed it teal before starting the stamping process. I’ve learned that when you’re too lazy to stir your bucket of dye and fabric for the suggested 45 minutes that the bottle tells you, you can end up with a subtle tie-dye feeling that I’m pretty into. But, really? Forty-five minutes, are you kidding me? Like I’m going to spend the entirety of my Law and Order SVU episode stirring a bucket of blue dye…I’ve got better things to watch.

 

Anyways, I used some craft foam to cut out my geometric cat face and glued the shape onto some thick cardboard to make a stamp. Once that was done, I painted the stamp with a generous layer of fabric paint and got to stampin’. You should do a few test stamps first to gauge how much pressure you need to stamp your garment, but it’s also helpful to have a small brush for touchups if needed.

As you can see in the last photo, Charlie is totally aware that she is posing in a cat related photo shoot, and is definitely not thinking, “GET. ME. OUTOFHERE.”

I’m quite pleased with my cat cardigan so far. It kind of reminds me of polka dots in a more whimsical way since the cat reference isn’t too obvious. It’s actually been hard not to take that cat stamp and skip around my house marking everything I see with a feline face, but I’ve restrained myself so far. Well, this is one more project to add to my kitty file here on the blog, I think it will eventually be quite the cat-egory, if you know what I mean.

Sorry. I had to do that. I “kitten” resist.

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9 thoughts on “DIY Cat Stamp Cardigan

  1. Melissa

    ohhh, I love that you dyed a white cardigan, AND stamped kitties! This opens up a whole new world regarding finding cardigans in colors that I want.
    If you haven’t seen this tutorial for making your own fabric paint stamp pad for stamping, check it out. http://papernstitchblog.com/2012/06/13/hand-stamped-handkerchief-diy/
    I’m an art teacher, and my first graders make stamps with me, exactly like you showed (I add a marker cap handle with some hot glue). With me they stamp paper, that we use to make origami, and then they use them to stamp t-shirts to make ‘kimonos’ since they study Japan in their classroom. This year the parent volunteers used the stamp pad technique I linked to, and it really made the whole process much easier!

    Reply
  2. Sarah

    “Cat-egory” – HA!

    I had the same experience when I dyed a dress! No thank you, sitting in a bathroom for 30 minutes stirring. I’ll live with my subtle tie-dye too, thank-you-very-much!

    Reply
  3. Kaelyn

    This blog post was quite an enjoyable read. You had me laughing several times and I like the DIY!

    Reply

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