Sew Can Do: Trim The Tee Craft Along Week 3: Rick Rack Snowflake Shirt

Today is the third installment of the Sew Can Do Craft Along: Trim The Tee. Each week in December I've been sharing a new how-to for holiday decorating a plain t-shirt, using basic supplies & skills.

Today I'm sharing how to make a super easy snowflake shirt using rick rack. This is the ideal last minute project! Get crafty for the season, but without having to spend lots of time - if you can sew a straight line, you can make it!

The trick is using simple rick rack trim. There's no need to worry about hems or edges and its shape gives all the detail you need. It's fast & fun, so grab the Trim The Tee button off the sidebar and let's get started!

You'll Need:
- A blank tee
- A package of rick rack (I used some white with sparkle flecks)
- 8.5in x 11in piece of of felt for lettering
- Notions (ball point needle, thread, scissors, disappearing marker/tailor's chalk)
- Options for lettering: Machine Embroidery (embroidery thread+stabilizer), Hand embroidery (embroidery floss), Hand-cut felt letters, Iron-on letters

Start out by cutting four pieces of rick rack for the body of the snowflake. I did about 6 inches long for my child sized shirt. Mark the center of each piece so it will be easy to layer them later.

Also cut 8 pieces for the edge details. For my standard size rick rack mine were about 1 inch wide, so I'd have a nice "W" shape:

Draw lines with tailor's chalk or marker on the center front of the shirt (I use a yard stick to get it nice & straight).

Pin the pieces of rick rack over the markings, overlapping the centers, and stitch into place down the middle. Either fold the cut edges under or fuse them by running a lighter underneath, before stitching, to prevent fraying.

Place the smaller rick rack pieces horizontally at the edges of main pieces and stitch into place.

I thought "Ready, Set, Snow!" would make some cute wording to go on it. I chose to machine embroider my lettering, but if you don't have an embroidery machine, you can hand embroider with floss, cut out the letters directly from felt or simply buy some iron-on letters from the craft store.

I have a how-to on doing machine embroidery HERE. Embroidering directly onto t-shirts isn't ideal, so I like to do the embroidery onto felt as an applique.

This is so easy because you can do a word at a time - no need to worry about centering or spacing. And because the felt is has texture and thickness, it adds nice dimension to the lettering when sewn on.

Pin the words to the shirt as desired and then stitch all the way around each word, very close to the felt's edge. Instead of trimming the felt around the letters I left them rectangular - with the font I used they reminded me of label maker lettering, so I went with that look:

Now someone's ready for a winter wonderland!

Great for some sweet holiday photos or looking festive at parties. And added bonus - since it's winter-themed it's still wearable long after the Christmas season is over.