Sew It - Cupcake Appliqué Toddler T-Shirt

This weeks a special little lady turns 2, my cousin's daughter Lorena. They live too far away for me to see much of them, but I want to sent something special in the post. 

My cousin appreciates unique, hand made clothing. She often buys dresses for Lorena from independent sellers online, and of course she looks gorgeous modelling them. I loved how the last appliqué tshirt turned out so I decided to do another one.

When I think of Lorena, I think of cupcakes, so that's the first thing I thought to appliqué on to the shirt. I did some Pinterest searching, and came up with this design -

Now, I can't be doing with all the faff of printing out templates and cutting and pinning. I got my bag of felt, chose the colours, and started to draw! 

Starting with beige felt for the cupcake base and a wash out fabric pen, I used a ruler to draw the top and after marking the edge points of the bottom, draw the sides. I then curved the corners, and drew the base of the cake. Time to cut!

Next, the first icing, for me in purple. I lay my cake base on top to make sure I drew it wide enough to sit nicely on top, and marked the top edges of my cake. I drew the base first, then a tall curved top. Time to cut again!

For the top icing, in white, I lay the purple icing on top and traced the top curve down to where the bottom frills start to fan out. Then I took the purple fel away, and drew the bottom frills. Last cut!

When you stack them, they should look like this -

Now for the lettering. Again, I like to do this free hand, but you can use a stencil if you prefer. It's hand made, and unique, and I like that to show. I like chunky letters with curved edges. I used the ruler to make sure they all stayed the same height as I drew them. 

All cut out, but getting the middle out of the A was fun! I fold the letter in half so I can snip a small gap in the section you're trying to cut out, then slide the scissors in to cut round it. That's simple in a letter like O, but tricky in an A! 

Time for placement! I'm using a Fruit of the Loom tshirt in age 2-3 from Amazon, they aren't overly expensive but wash really well. I've pinned the cake base first -

I whip stitch the border of this in a brown cotton, then draw 3 lines in my washout pen and do a very close running stitch up these to add detail. Next, I pin the purple icing, and whip stitch the border in a lilac cotton. 

I know that the white icing is going to be stitched in pretty much the same place along the top border, so it may seem like I'm creating extra work for myself. This shirt needs to be toddler proof, so the extra layer of stitching seems worth it to me. 

I had popped down to one of my local fabric shops in the morning to get some cotton thread, and while I was there I spotted this cute strawberry button which I thought would be perfect to finish off the cupcake. Some of my felt is from there too, as I'm often popping in. They're online at Calico Laine.

I pinned on the lettering, and whip stitched the borders using purple cotton. 

Once it was all done, a quick wash and a good iron and it was complete. Ready to post to the birthday girl.

Happy birthday Lorena!