Susan‘s sweet little girl, Pearl, turned one about two weeks ago, and since she’s just about the coolest kiddo ever, we had to make her something special. She’s growing like a little wild weed, so we thought that a year of unique hand screenprinted T-shirts would be just the ticket. Josh and I each designed two. Check them out below.

This T-shirt is Pearl's size right now, and my original design. Since it fits currently, I anticipate that it'll have maybe a month of use before she's bursting out of it. It's the Steel Bridge, which is my favorite bridge in Portland. I designed the artwork and screened it in a metallic pewter color. I'm planning on turning this design into a letterpress piece as well.

This is one of the shirts Josh made. It's a monkey/gorilla stencil from the Stencil 101 book, and Josh made it glow-in-the-dark. To work with glowin-in-the-dark screenprinting inks, you have to first put on a base of opaque white--we learned that the hard way. Once the white is dry, you overprint the white with the glow-in-the-dark ink. Everything's better when it glows, right?

This is my other contribution. If I timed it correctly, it should fit Pearl right around fall--the start of the next Portland Trail Blazers season. It's the phenomenal Brandon Roy, guard for the Portland Trail Blazers, All-Star, All-NBA 2nd Team Member and all-around fabulous player and person. Pearl has a Brandon Roy jersey that she wears on game days--which coordinates with her Trail Blazers socks. I'm thinking that at the rate she's growing, her jersey may not fit her all season, but the T-shirt can hopefully fill in the wardrobe gaps next season. I neglected to take a picture, but the back of the shirt has an appliqued Blazers logo on it. I owe Pearl a pair of Trail Blazers pants to go with it, but I want to wait until fall to make them, so I can get a better idea of the sizing. This is my original design, and actually part of my letterpress project. It's neat seeing the image in two different mediums.

Josh's second contribution was the biggest hit of all of the T-shirts--"I brake for hummus." Pearl's favorite food is hummus, so Josh made the largest T-shirt a snazzy gold printed shirt proclaiming her loyalty to garbanzos, tahini and garlic. 'Nuff said.

Happy first birthday, Pearl! Can’t wait to make you four more next year!

~Sarah

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Yes, Josh really made this flag.

Yes, it’s completely reversible.

Yes, he cut and appliqued the felt pinwheel.

Yes, he sewed the whole thing together.

And, yes, he hand screenprinted the “Don’t Tread On Me.”

Oh, and yes, that’s Josh holding it up and he’s about 6’2″, so it’s really, really big.

And then he informed me it was a gift for me.

Because my husband is just that awesome.

~Sarah

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Red, black & white banners flying on the stage outside the Rose Garden Arena before the Trail Blazers' first playoff game in several years. These semi-transparent banners are really beautiful rustling in the breeze with the cityscape in the background.

I’m hoping that “Josh per a tres!” actually does mean “Josh for three!” in Catalan, because that’s what the online translator said, and those things are never wrong–right?

I thought I’d share Josh’s latest screen printing project–an impromptu one, at that. (Although, let’s all agree that normal people don’t plan and execute a three-color screen print on an “impromptu” basis–Josh is weird.)

It’s been well documented that Josh has officially jumped on the Portland Trail Blazers bandwagon in a big way. (Although, really, he’s been on the bandwagon for about three years, but he’s reached the terminal stage of BlazerMania–emotional investment.) He has also sucked it up and finally become, like the rest of us here in Portland, a big Rudy Fernandez fan. Portland hearts Rudy, an flashy player from Spain–and people are wearing the T-shirts around to prove it. (Seriously, the now-defunct G.I. Joe’s sold them. First they were just women’s shirts, but then they started stocking men’s and you’d see a lot of very old male Blazers fans wearing them too.) I think the final straw was last Wednesday, at the Trail Blazers’ last regular season game, and Josh’s return to going to games after nearly a month of dealing with a nightmarish situation with regard to the horrendous customer service by the Trail Blazers season ticket staff and dealing with the thugish occupants of section 322 in the Rose Garden over the course of 41 games (and really, I’m pretty sure that I’m not quite ready to drop my complaint after the service folks’ pathetic reaction to our concerns). What was so special about Rudy’s performance that night? Well, he made six freaking three-point shots! Six! Which meant that he also broke the rookie record for most threes in a season. (You can check out some highlights of Rudy hitting threes this season here and if you’re feeling really wild and crazy, check out this phenomenal bit of play from Rodolfo.)

So, a bit more about Josh’s inspiration. Rudy makes a really unique and energizing hand gesture when he makes a three, and fans have started imitating him when he scores. It’s joyous, and it gets everyone fired up.

Portland, Oregon - Where the NBA Playoffs are finally happening again!

Josh got the idea to create a screenprint based upon the logo from the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Spain–you know, as a shout-out to that awesome city and country. (We went to Spain in 1998 and spent quite a bit of time in Barcelona, it’s one of the most wonderful places we’ve been–and we’d love to go back sometime.) Do you remember that logo? 

This is Josh’s re-interpretation:

A last-minute three-color screenprint? What a maniac!

Josh elongated the “face” to better resemble Rudy, and added Rudy’s signature “3″ hand gesture. The results are pretty nifty, if I do say so myself. 

The Trail Blazers put up this awesome banners of all the players all over the Rose Garden Arena outdoor concourse. They're really swell-looking. Here, Josh demonstrates Rudy's "3" sign under one of the Rudy banners.

Now, Josh would be the first to admit (actually, he did admit it to me yesterday), that he got all nervous about the playoff game on Saturday night (with good reason, apparently) and had to do something, hence the complexity of the three-color screenprint. He also printed me one. 

Josh tried to get me to take my picture under a certain players banner, but I thought that would be 1) a mixed basketball metaphor and 2) too Fan Girl.

Sadly, the Blazers lost their first playoff game, and I was–frankly–devastated. I never imagined that they’d lose, let alone get blown out. But, I’ve got to believe they’ll come back with a vengeance. So, I’m asking y’all a favor: If you currently have no NBA loyalties, or if your team’s not in the playoffs (I’m speaking to you, Phoenix Suns fans–I rooted for y’all’s team for a long while during the Jail Blazers Era and have even read :07 or Less.), please consider sending some positive playoff energy our way. It would mean a hell of a lot. For inspiration, here’s a video we shot at the Playoff Rally at Pioneer Courthouse Square on Thursday. 

15,000 of us showed up to cheer on the team just for making the playoffs! Look how excited everyone is! We need this here in Portland! So, please, send some positive vibes here to the Pacific Northwest.

~Sarah

P.S. You can check out my Flickr set for our pics from Saturday’s game.

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Front of the quasi-famous "Channing for Mayor" shirt.

Anyway, Sarah made the shirts as a silly project for herself and a few friends, and doesn’t have any more. But, we still have the screen, so there is the possibility of printing some more. However, there’s a fair amount of time and labor involved, so if you’ve landed here looking for where you can find your very own Channing for Mayor shirt, please leave a comment here (if you’ve never commented before, your comment will be held for moderation) or drop Sarah a line at sewersewist [at] gmail [dot] com, with a subject line that will be kind of obvious. If there are enough folks who want one, then we’ll do a small run–probably in the red and blue shown in this photo and this photo–and put them up on Big Cartel. We’re not looking to profit from the shirts or anything (in fact, we’re not a big fan of folks looking to make money off of other people’s image–if that makes sense), but but shirts + ink + labor do add up.

Back of shirt - "Keepin' Portland Weird."

Thanks, all, for your interest in keepin’ Portland weird.

~Sarah & Josh

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Last week Susan and I went to the Trail Blazers vs. Memphis Grizzlies game and, prior to the game, went to their first-ever “TweetUp,” which basically involved us getting in to watch the team’s shoot-around (you can’t normally get into the Rose Garden that early), and some chitchat with some Blazers staff and a group photo. The highlight was, obviously, the shoot-around. It’s been well-documented here that there’s a horrifying lack of Channing Frye gear in the officially-sanctioned “Fan Shop,” and that–as a result–I’ve had to resort to making my own. (It’s also been well-documented that Channing’s my favorite player not named Brandon Roy–although I pretty much like the entire team at this point.) What I haven’t mentioned before is that Josh, Susan and I all have a joke that when this whole pro basketball thing is over, that Channing would be a great mayor, because of his obvious love for the City of Roses. (Yes, we know that you probably need more skills than just “enthusiasm” to be mayor, but it’s a joke, okay? Although Kevin Johnson recently became mayor of Sacramento, so it’s not a completely crazy suggestion.)

So I did some research on vintage campaign signs (yes, I always take these things way too seriously) and came up with a design and screen printed us up some shirts. (An aside: Learning to create my own screen prints has opened up a whole new world for me. If I come up with something crazy I want on a shirt, I don’t have to order it from Cafe Press or whatever. I can just fire up the computer, create a design a screen print it in our kitchen. It’s incredible.)

Here's the design of the front. This typeface is, brilliantly, called something like "Politician." It's super-cheesy and kind of awesome (not dissimilar from Channing himself?).

And the "campaign slogan" on the back. This is really funny. Trust me.

(In case you were wondering–you can achieve that perfect, basketball colored rust tone by mixing equal parts pure red ink and gold opaque ink. It’s actually quickly become my favorite mixed ink, since it looks so nice on black.)

The “campaign slogan” was inspired by Channing’s blog, in which last spring and summer he spent an amazing amount of space chronicling the various nuances of Portland’s weirdness. (And, really, there are a lot of things that make this city truly weird–and I’m a native. I can’t imagine how strange Portland must seem to newcomers, even newcomers who know how awesome Portland is.)

We were pretty thrilled with the results, and I got a high five from some random dude on the Rose Garden concourse who informed me in a very earnest manner that, “People just don’t understand how awesome Channing is and how much he means to Portland!” He may have been hyperventilating just a bit, too.

Check out the shirts “in action.”

We were a little surprised that the other TweetUppers didn't even give us crazy looks over our shirts. I mean, I would probably look at us like we're slightly whacked out, but I guess Blazers tweeters are an understanding lot. Either that or they thought that we'd inadvertently wandered into their gathering and were doing their best to ignore us. (The actual game was another story, though. At one point, I thought Susan & I were going to have to throw down with some serious Channing haters in the row in front of us. Seriously, who the hell goes to a basketball game so angry? That's plain crazy.)

You see, we’re just doing our part in keepin’ Portland weird.

~Sarah

Note: If you’re so inclined, you can check out my photos from the shoot-around here.

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This cool hoodie can't be cursed... Can it?

Before you continue reading this post, I do want to make an important point: I’m not a Fan Girl. And I’m certainly not a Channing Frye Fan Girl. If I were going to be a Fan Girl of any of the Trail Blazers players, it would have to be Martell Webster. Yes, I know Rudy Fernandez is the flavor of the month, but, for me–if I were to become a Fan Girl in a parallel universe–it would have to be Martell. (Now you may click through to the rest of the post, and settle in for a lengthy post.)

I’ve mentioned here before that I’m a big fan of the Portland Trail Blazers’ backup power forward, Channing Frye. (And you should be too, even if you’re not a basketball fan–you can read a great article about him here.) Seriously, the dude seems like a total Portlander–kind of geeky, really funny, super into food like the rest of here in Portland, writes a highly entertaining blog, etc, etc. And, like most everyone else here, he has some funny-looking dogs. So, theoretically, to quite a few Portlanders/Blazers fans, he’s “one of us.” And in Portland, that means something.

While the guy’s definitely developed a pretty big fan base here in Portland, I like to think I was an early passenger on the Frye bandwagon. He did some really entertaining interviews when he was first traded here from the Knicks, including one in which he declared that he was a “…buffet of goodness…” and then, shortly after the trade, Josh and I saw him wandering around the Pearl District–which was sort of cool, since at least we don’t see a lot of the Trail Blazers players around town, since they mostly live out in the ‘burbs and probably frequent P.F. Chang’s at Bridgeport Village or El Gaucho downtown. Honestly, it reminded me of back in the day when people used to see Trail Blazers players at Costco or whatever. (Seriously, everyone and their uncle once claimed to have seen Jerome Kersey at the grocery store. I don’t know if he was really into food shopping or everyone was full of it, but it’s sort of funny. Oh, and quite a few people I knew saw Kevin Duckworth at the Fred Meyer in Oregon City. And Tonya Harding. Not together, obviously, but it was the same early 1990s time-frame. And the same Fred Meyer.)

My point is, I was pretty excited about Channing Frye early on. I used to have fairly regular arguments with a guy I used to work with about whether or not Channing was “awesome” or not (although I think we probably should have defined the term “awesome” first–since I think we were working with two entirely different definitions of the word). And I’ve also successfully converted a number of people into “Chan Fans”–including my husband and my mom. It’s actually kind of a weird secret handshake or something–I cheered really loudly for the guy for some reason (possibly that he was actually getting to play?) and all the sudden Guy Who Sits Next to Me at the Blazers Games (I have no idea of his name) stands up and yells, “Yeah! Channing!” Then he sits back down, looks at me sheepishly and says, “Channing’s The Man.” Ever since, Guy Who Sits Next to Me and I have regular conversations at the Blazers games. There have been other instances like this as well that I won’t bore you with–assuming you’re still with me. Oh, and one time I was forced to stare down a really uncouth dude who was sitting behind me at a game screaming some really unprintable things about Channing. (I have a whole other thing about people yelling negative stuff at our own team–it’s pretty unacceptable in my book, unless the person’s a criminal. Or has missed a game because they’re visiting a strip club instead of going to a funeral.)

If you click through to the Flickr page, there are non-topical notes on this randomly-inserted photo that I put in here because it's such a cool picture.

Turns out, Channing really has grown to love Portland, has met a Portland girl to whom he’s now engaged and is, apparently, planning on making our wonderful city his lifelong home. Pretty cool, right? Except, unfortunately, the guy’s future with our team is looking kind of bleak. I could get all into the details, but this is a sewing/crafting blog, not a sports blog (despite all the Trail Blazers-related posting I do, and Josh’s dabbling in vintage football-inspired craft projects), and if you’re really wanting to understand it all, read the Willy Week article I referenced earlier in this post.

Awhile back I went to the Trail Blazers fan shop at the Rose Garden, and was looking for a Channing Frye T-shirt or something–since I have a pretty decent selection of Brandon Roy shirts already, I thought it was probably time to diversify to my selection for the forty-one games we have to go to througout the season. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a single item. There were tons of Rudy Fernandez, Brandon Roy, Lamarcus Aldridge, Nic Batum, Travis Outlaw, Joel Pryzbilla, Sergio Rodriguez and Greg Oden items. Hell, even Steve Blake has some stuff at the shop. Even Ike Diogu! But ZERO Channing Frye items. Perhaps there was a run on stuff, but I kind of doubt it for some reason. More irritated than I probably should have been, I decided to create my own Channing Frye shirt to wear to some games. You know, to sort of prove a point.

Josh and I had an extensive debate over which image to use. He contended that I should use a photo of Channing taking a jump shot, since he's really a jump shooter these days. (Josh is more concerned with accuracy that I, apparently.) However, dunking is cooler, plus the dunking photos all had him making weird faces. Which to me is much funnier.

I spent quite a bit of time creating the image for this screen print. It’ actually harder to manipulate sports graphics, because there’s a lot of motion captured in photos–fabric, for example, is in motion, which makes it complex–that can look crummy screen printed, if you’re not careful. My objective was to make it look comic book-y (at least as good as the dorky comic book characters the team uses during the player introductions), which I think I accomplished pretty well. I also had to give a shout-out to the famous “buffet of goodness” line, since it’s so damn hilarious. (I had a running joke with Josh for a long time that if I ever ran into Channing Frye on the street I’d have to tell him that I have that line as one of favorite quotes on my Facebook profile–I “collect” favorite quotations, so it’s one of many, and if you know me well, you know that’s not such a weird thing to say. But, then I realized that would sound slightly crazy, which is never a good thing.)

This print is pretty huge, actually. I love that the reference is obscure enough and that the name is in tiny enough print, that not a ton of people understand it. Like I said, it's like a not-so-secret club of slightly geeky Portlanders who are fans of Channing Frye.

I printed this on a bright red hoodie–which, as I told Antoinette–was a critical missing piece of my wardrobe. I mixed three different blue inks to get a deep, rich, metallic blue that would really pop on the bright red. (I really picked the blue and red because I love that color combo. I realized later on, that they’re also University of Arizona’s colors, which worked out well, given that’s where Channing played college ball. I have zero loyalty to any Pac-10 school, although I generally root for Oregon State, so I have no qualms about wearing another teams’ colors.)

I used an unconventional font for my felt numbers--I really like that it's got a mid-century look to it. It's also one of the few fonts that uses the open fours, rather than closed.

I also cut some blue felt and appliqued the number 44 on the front of the hoodie (although I forgot to back it with stabilizer–even though I have some–which is too bad, hope the letters don’t eventually warp the knit fabric).

Now this photo's just a bit of narcissism. Rachel/Average Jane Crafter said it was a good photo of me, so I had to post it. Sorry about that.

So back to that whole curse thing that I mentioned about a million words ago…

In my thirty years of Blazers fandom (I did take a lengthy hiatus/complete strike from the team for the better part of a decade because of the whole Jail Blazers thing, but I’m counting that time, because it was so painful), I have a long history of rooting for bench guys who inevitably get trade or not re-signed. While I always have a starter or two that I really like, I always have some bench guy that I root very hard for–it’s just my thing. Drazen Petrovic and Danny Young were a couple of my favorites when I was young. If I hadn’t been on Blazers strike at the time, I’m sure I would have been a big Brian Grant fan. And then right after we moved back to Portland, Ime Udoka made the team–and was the reason that I ended my self-imposed Blazers strike. What happen to all those guys? Traded or not resigned. So I sort of feel like “my players” are doomed. Seriously, could it be via some butterfly effect that by my cheering for these dudes they are guaranteed to not return to the team? Have I doomed Channing Frye to not return to Portland because I’ve been cheering for the guy for a season and a half? These are the questions I’m pondering…

This hoodie is further evidence that there may be something to that theory. You see, I’ve worn it several times to Blazers games, and there’s mounting evidence of a possible curse not only associated with me, but with my totally awesome DIY hoodie. I have worn it to two games in which Channing didn’t play at all and I wore it on the day (not a game day, just a normal day) that this trade rumor erupted. Seriously, I’m starting to worry. Susan and  I went to the Blazers game last night, and I wore my hoodie and she wore the T-shirt I made for her.

T-shirt I screen printed for Susan. This deep maroon ink only looks good on heathered gray. Unfortunately, there was a little clog in the screen around the nose on the image, so Susan's version isn't quite as sharp-looking as mine.

The result? Well, with two custom “Buffet of Goodness” shirts, Channing did play, but didn’t, uh, do anything. He missed his one shot attempt. So, there’s still a possibility that there’s a curse at play, but I would deam those results “inconclusive.” We’ll see… There’s a part of me that really believes in sports curses, and I think this is fairly “normal,” as are good luck charms and other superstitions–just ask Henry Abbott. and hell, even Barack Obama had all sorts of good luck charms that he carried during his campaign.

So, anyway, that was an awfully verbose manner in which to describe my latest project, and its potential downside. I think it turned out pretty sweet, to be honest. And I’m glad that at least one person will be wearing Channing Frye gear at the Rose Garden this season. I hope he gets to stick around. And if not, I’ll keep cheering for Channing.

~Sarah

Note: Check out Susan’s thoughts on the same subject over here.

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Anyway, this post is about a T-shirt I screen printed and embroidered, but you’re going to have to humor me a bit while I digress…

I'm not a crazed fan! Really. I'm not. I swear.

It’s been well established that I’m a crazy fan of Portland Trail Blazers basketball. And keep in mind, Trail Blazers fans are a special breed of crazy in general, so that’s saying something. This season, we are actually season ticket holders. We have seats waaaaaay up in section 322 to each and every game this year. This is going to sound cheesy, but this is actually a life-long dream of mine. When I was a kid it was nearly impossible to get tickets. When Josh and I moved back to Portland, no one was going to the games, because of the whole Jail Blazers thing, and we were able to score all kinds of free or deeply discounted tickets (great seats, too). So we went a lot. (An aside: for the longest time, I thought that if I was at the game, the Trail Blazers couldn’t lose–it wasn’t until Portland played the stupid Clippers that season that I attended a Blazers’ loss.) That year, 2006-07, was Brandon Roy‘s Rookie season–he eventually become Rookie of the Year, Ime Udoka made the team (he’s a Portlander) and Nate McMillan was coaching. The vibe was changing, and fans kind of knew that it was Zach Randolph‘s last season before he was traded. Portlanders knew the team was changing–and something good was going to happen. Then Portland won the #1 pick in the 2007 NBA Draft.

It was amazing.

Blazermania was back.

But, Greg Oden–our #1 pick–got injured out was out all last season. Free and discounted tickets were still fairly easy to come by. This season, with Greg back, Brandon Roy having made the All-Star team in 2007-08 and Rudy Fernandez coming over from Spain, we knew it would be tough to get tickets, let alone keep riding the Free Ticket Express. So, we sucked it up and bought season tickets. (Actually, George Bush bought us season tickets–that’s how we spent our “Economic Stimulus” check.)

Which means that, for 42 games of basketball, I need more T-shirts.

We sneaked down to the parking garage at the Rose Garden to take this picture. I like the giant Brandon Roy feet in the background.

Using one of the cheapo pajama top long-sleeved T-shirts from Target, I created my opening game look. First, I cut off the arms to three-quarter length. Then I embroidered, using the alphabet from Jenny Hart‘s Sublime Stitching, “Rip City!” onto the back.

The embroidery's not what I'd call "centered" or "straight" per se, but it'll do...

Then, using InDesign, I made a star stencil with a 7 in it (the 7 for Brandon Roy’s jersey number and the star because he was an All-Star last season). I cut out the stencil using freezer paper, and stuck it on one of our old, crappy silk screens. Then I spray glued the 7 and stuck it in the middle–basically creating a reverse stencil within a regular stencil, if that makes sense. I inked it up, and it resulted in this snazzy–and quick–screen printed shirt.

This was a super quick process to make a screen print. I did it the afternoon of the game, and even had time to wash the shirt before I wore it.

A very happy Trail Blazers fan.

I’m actually planning a few more shirts to wear throughout the season. The next one is going to be a Channing Frye shirt. Channing is definitely the weirdest member of the Blazers team and has totally embraced being a Portlander. He has an awesomely bizarre blog as well, that’s totally worth checking out–even if you don’t know a jump shot from a lay up.

In related news, through running the Obama Craft Project site during the general election (it’s still going strong, too, I’m just not posting projects everyday anymore), I got to know Susan Beal–Portlander, crafty gal, Bead Simple author and BLAZERS FAN! She and her hubby have had us over to watch a couple of away games (Casa de Sewer-Sewist is without cable television), and Susan and I went to the Blazers vs. Kings game on Monday night. Anyway, if you noticed the lovely vintage-looking earrings I’m wearing in the first photo of this post, they are some that Susan made.

The deep scarlet color of these beads is one of my very favorite colors. Remind me to wear jewelry more often.

Anyway, as a public service announcement, I wanted to let y’all know that Susan has super cool kits up in her Etsy shop so you can make your very own. There’s more information over on her blog. Personally, I think that they would make great gifts for someone who’s interested in learning how to make jewelry, but don’t know where to begin, or maybe a creative teenager who’s into DIY. (Which reminds me, I used to love to make jewelry when I was a teenager and then quit when I went to college. I should dig my jewelry-making tools out of cold storage and give it a whirl again sometime.)

~Sarah

P.S. Rip City!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Me.

With autumn bringing cool weather, I needed a new hoodie to wear (by the way, sometime we’ll have to ask Sarah to write about her hoodie addiction). For inspiration, I wanted it to look like the old Dayton Triangles jerseys from the 1920s, because I am from Dayton and I like stripes and appliqués. And I really like any excuse to screen print just about anything.

Why the Dayton Triangles? Well, my dad remembers them playing at the park near his house when he was growing up in Dayton, Ohio in the 1950s.

I started out with a plain gray hoodie and used tape to create the stripes I wanted. I then used a blank screen to spread the ink.  (Which made one hell of a mess.) After drying, I was left with even stripes on both sleeves.

I really can’t believe this actually worked.

To make the bottom half of the hoodie navy–after briefly considering screen printing the whole bottom–I wisely bought a navy crew neck sweatshirt and cut it underneath the armholes, I then cut the gray sweatshirt two inches under the armholes to give it more length, (one and a half inches with the seam allowance).

On the chest, I made a simple triangle out of wool felt and stitched it onto the a larger white piece of felt and then sewed it onto the front of the “jersey.”

This was really a quick and easy project, except for the long drying time of the sleeves.  With the cold weather coming, it looks like I am going to get back on the sewing machine and out of the garage (where we screen print).

~Josh

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Recognize the logo?

That would be Union Pacific.

We’ve already talked about why we’re supporting Obama-Biden this year, so we won’t get into that any further (although, if you’re inclined, check out what’s going on over at The Obama Craft Project), but we’re also big fans of trains, and Josh’s dad is a HUGE train aficionado. Huge. He subscribes to train magazines. So, Josh decided that his dad really needed a custom screen-printed Obama-Biden hoodie that was train-inspired, and this was the result.

The challenge was printing the two-color image. Despite that we have a number of screen printing reference books, it’s still very much a trial and error type of situation—one of those old-fashioned “learn by doing” situations. After a lot of trial and error, Josh figured out that he could lay transparencies over each part of the logo, so that red ink wouldn’t encroach on the blue and vice-versa. It worked quite well (although some ink did dry in the screen, which is frustrating), and the colors turned out rich and opaque, thanks again to the Jacquard screen printing ink we like so much.

Josh also made T-shirts for each of us, but they’re not nearly as awesome at the sweatshirt that’s en route to Ohio. The thick fleece took this large, bold graphic much better than the thin jersey of a T-shirt.

Good thing we mailed it off to Josh’s dad right away, because Josh seemed to be getting a bit attached to it during our “photo shoot.”

~S & J

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