I couldn’t resist sharing the tutorial for this DIY Christmas shirt, even if it is only 2 days before Christmas! It’s not too late to make one if you can run out to a craft store and get all the supplies. It is super cute and festive. Better yet, you’ll be the only one who has one because you made it yourself!

This tutorial uses a Cricut Explore Air to make the design. Using Iron on Vinyl, you can make so many cute projects. I also used the same method to personalize our stockings this year.

If you want to use the exact same design that I made, you can download it by clicking here. But I also encourage everyone to make your own projects and put your own personal spin onto it! There are so many cute festive words or designs you can use to make a DIY Christmas Shirt once you know how. And they make great gifts! You can make each shirt something you know the giftee will love. The materials for this project cost less than $10!

All right, if you’re ready for the tutorial, keep scrolling!

Supplies:

• Tshirt
• Iron
• Iron on Vinyl
• Cricut Explore Air
• 12×12 Cricut Mat
• Weeding Tool

Step One: Design Shirt

First, you’ll need to design your shirt in Cricut design space. I used the font bombshell. I wanted my shirt to say “fa la la la la” which is one of my favorite festive phrases.

You can design your design to be spaced exactly how you will want it in the final product. I chose to cut each “la” separately to try and use as little vinyl as possible.

When you’re using iron on vinyl, you need to print it as a mirror image. After you press “make it” in Cricut design space, below where you designate the mat size, you can choose “mirror image,” as you can see in the picture below.

Step Two: Prepare Vinyl and Cut

With iron on vinyl, you want to place the vinyl on your mat with the front facing down. With glittery vinyl, this is super easy to tell, because the front is glittery and the back is dull looking. You can see that in the picture below. You only  need to place vinyl on the mat where your design will be cut. So for my design, that was about 9.5″x6.5″.

Once your mat is ready, load your mat into the Cricut. Be sure that the setting is set to “iron on vinyl.” Then press go and let the Cricut do the cutting!

Step Three: Weed Vinyl

The next thing you want to do is called weeding the vinyl. First, you peel off any of the vinyl that isn’t part of your final design. So pretty much all the negative space will be removed. Iron on vinyl has two layers- the vinyl itself, and a plastic layer on top of that (or underneath it when it’s upside down on the mat). You peel away the extra vinyl from the plastic layer. This should be easy to do, leaving your final design there. If any of your design starts to come up, you can just press it back onto the plastic and it should stick.

Once you peel off the excess, you will still have to remove the holes from inside the letters. This design happens to have holes in every single letter. I use the Cricut weeding tool to remove the middle of the letters. I pretty much just poke it until it starts to come up and then peel it back.

Step Four: Place Design and Iron

Since I wanted to be able to manipulate the letter placement and use as little vinyl as possible, I didn’t print my design how I wanted it to look on the final shirt. So I had to cut each piece and place it on the shirt where I wanted it. The plastic front is sticky, but not too sticky, so it’s easy to lift and adjust each section until you have it where you want.

Once your design is where you want it to be, it’s time to iron. You can place a piece of cardboard inside the shirt to make ironing easier. I used a file folder. Make sure not to use any steam when you iron, and set the iron to cotton. Go over the design until it is fully adhered, and then peel the plastic off the top. If you peel to early and the design starts to come up, no big deal, just press it back down and iron again. It took me about 1-2 minutes of ironing for this design, and that was probably more than necessary.

Once you peel the plastic off the letters, your shirt is ready!

And then you’re done!

Now you’ve got a snazzy new Christmas shirt that no one else will have. One of a kind!

Mine turned out super adorable! The red and gold is very festive. I am always impressed with the quality of Cricut’s iron on vinyl. The glitter does not come off of the design or rub off the shirt, even after multiple washings. If you love your shirt you can wear it time and time again. It will last longer if you wash it inside out, but I sometimes forget to do that and my shirts are still great!

These make a great gift too! You could easily add someone’s name to it, or do different color shirts and vinyls for different people.

This shirt is so happy and festive, what’s not to love?

Now that I’m writing this post and wearing my shirt, I’m never going to stop singing Christmas carols. Tis the season to be jolly…..

And the song may be stuck in my head forever. And now yours too probably. Sorry!

I’m so excited to wear my shirt this Christmas!

Let me know how making your own DIY Christmas Shirt goes for you! You can click the thumbnail below to download the file to make this same design.

supplies in this post

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