Rainbow Shirts

So as you can see its been kinda quiet over here posting-wise! I haven't been able to respond to all my lovely comments, or invitations to link parties lately. (I will soon though!)  These last weeks have been my last weeks of grad school.   All of my final papers, presentations and final evaluations have taken over my life!

*and from writing so many papers this post will naturally be very long. you've been warned ;)*

For the past few weeks I have been up past midnight working on something school-related almost every night.  It is nearly impossible for me to do work during the day.  I have tried, and it never works well.  I end up getting upset at Eliana for interrupting me so many times, which isn't fair to her at all.  So throughout my grad school experience I have done my school work after Eliana is asleep.  I can concentrate better when she is asleep anyways.  So because I am in the final stretch, pulling everything together, this means lately I have been up late almost every night.  Because of this my amazing husband has gone above and beyond in so many ways. He almost always stays up with me to give me emotional support,  to be an extra set of eyes to read through my papers with me and most importantly goes out to the store at the drop of a dime if I feel that ice cream will enhance my paper writing skills ;)


Even though we both stay up until sometimes 2 am, he still has to get up and go to work.  He also gets up in the middle of the night 9 times out of 10 if Eliana calls out, knowing that when I get up in the middle of the night (especially when my mind is over-occupied) I can't easily go back to sleep. So he lets me sleep and attends to whenever Eliana needs something. He continually gets less sleep than me, on purpose, and I whole-heartedly appreciate it and I know I couldn't have done this all without him.


On top of that Eliana was sick for a week with a stomach bug. I'll spare you the details ;) Thankfully yesterday was the first day she woke up without being sick! *happy dance*!  Sadly, now David doesn't feel too great. I just hope this bug doesn't hit me until after my final presentation on Monday. 


So enough about my exhausting life and onto more fun things... ;)


As promised from my post on Eliana's Rainbow Birthday Party, here is a simple tutorial on how to make the rainbow shirts we made. I meant to post this weeks ago, but I found it super hard to justify writing up this post instead of finishing a paper. yeah I know right? I'm good like that. Actually no, it took a lot of willpower to not write the post because honestly this is way more fun than a paper. I'm not ashamed to admit that ;)


And p.s. don't make fun of my lack of craft tutorial skills or photos... I usually only post cute lunches ;) I'll try to use the pictures more than the words.. we'll see how this goes...

rainbow colored fabric paints

For this project you will need:

*Rainbow colored fabric paints

*Gray or Silver fabric paint for the cloud (we used silver glitter)

*shirt to paint on (we went with white)

We didn't use the traditional colors for the rainbow. We used "watermelon" for red and our green was more of a teal color.  We also went with shimmery fabric paint.  So for this project, pick what works best for you :) 

Eliana rearranged the paints and told me that I had to take a picture like this. Yes ma'am ;)

So now that you have your materials you can make your rainbow shirt. For this tutorial I show it on a piece of paper but we (and by we I mean my husband) used this exact method the shirts.

Step 1: Draw out your first color of the rainbow in a thin line

Step 2: Use your finger to smudge the line

That is David's finger in case you thought to yourself "Oh my! she has manly hands!" ;)

Step 3 + 4: Draw out your next color of the rainbow and use your finger to smudge the line

*remember to wipe off the paint on your finger between colors*

It doesn't have to be perfect. It should look something like this:

Steps 5-12: Continue the process with all colors of the rainbow:

*remember to wipe off the paint on your finger between colors*

Ignore that yellow drop of spilled paint. that's what I get trying to do this with Eliana and Mia running around ;)

Step 13 + 14: Add your clouds with your gray or silver fabric paint 

and smudge with your finger

Step 15: let the paint dry on shirt overnight.

Step 16: Wear your shirt! :)

As you can see that rainbow isn't perfect, but like I said before it doesn't have to be perfect ..Or at least that is what I am telling my perfectionist self. That is why David did the shirts, not me.  I would have had to buy 20 shirts and would have mapped out the rainbow to make sure the lines were perfect, the arcs were even, etc. But for your sake, agree with David on this one. It doesn't have to be perfect :)

David did all three shirts in less than a half hour. It was so quick, and easy. And actually it is so simple your kids can do it with you, or by themselves depending on how old they are. We chose to do make the shirts while Eliana was sleeping to surprise her in the morning :)

The completed project:

So we decided to make Eliana's shirt a full rainbow, like the tutorial. On our shirts the rainbows were slanted so that when we stood together it looked like one complete rainbow. The clouds we decided to leave open on the inside so that we when we stood next to each other the rainbow was complete.

My shirt

David's shirt

We decided to make the shirts that way (prepare yourself for mushy moment) because we are complete when we are together. And our lives became so much more filled with love and laughter with our Eliana, who fills our rainbow. 

It may sound corny, but there was meaning to the reason we made the shirts like that.

I had come up with the idea to make rainbow shirts, but David's creativity took it the next level. I may be creative with food, but not so much with arts and crafts! I gotta say, we make an amazing team ;)  I know I have been nothing but a mush today but I can't help it. I am so thankful to have such an amazing husband. He has always supported me with everything, but literally I could have never made it through the past two years in grad school without his love and support. *I love you babe!*


OK seriously enough mushy for today ;)


....And here are some rainbow cake balls: (I couldn't have a post without food in it!!)

This one is for you Myra ;)

I made these cake balls last year.  They still make me happy when I look at them :)
I love how colorful and bright and cheery rainbows are. Of course these crafts and food never compare to the beauty of a real rainbow but I hope this post brought some brightness into your week!

I Link up. Check it out!
I am linking this post to Rainbow Connection! Check it out for more Rainbow inspired crafts, foods or activities :)