Guest Post: DIY Painted Baby Leggings

Hello The Vintage Apple readers! My name is Julie and I blog about decorating my home, diy projects, and life as a new mama to my 6 month old son Hudson over at The Girl in the Red Shoes. I'm the kind of girl who never has her act together, but manages to find the time to do a fun project here and there in between taking pictures of my  my kid's poop explosions and posting them to instagram. (you can find me at girlintheredshoes). I am so excited to share my latest diy project with all of you today! Get excited...it's a good one!

I've had my eye on some adorable printed baby leggings lately...but it seems like most of the ones out there were at least $25! I don't know about you, but I have a hard time paying that much for something my baby will wear for 3 months (if that!). So, I decided to try and make my own painted baby leggings...and they turned out super cute!

First, you'll need some plain leggings. The red and grey pair are by Carter's and the white and black pair are from the little girls section at Target. (Here's a tip for you boy mamas....always check out the girls section for gender neutral bottoms. These leggings are technically girls (shhhh...don't tell my husband!) but no one can tell. Size up by one size if you do this. They are also cheaper and fit better, in my opinion, than the boys pants....crazy!)

Make sure you wash and dry your leggings first so that your painted section won't warp in the wash. You'll need fabric paint, an x-acto knife, a stencil brush, and blank stencil paper to make your own stencil. I found all of the craft supplies at Hobby Lobby. Total spent: $5 for supplies and $27 for 6 pairs of leggings.

I used three stencils for this project: a star, deer antlers, and an arrow! The star was super easy to make, but the other two required a bit more work. I googled deer antlers and ended up using a few different images to ultimately come up with this one. Then I drew the pattern on to my stencil and used my x-acto knife and tiny scissors to cut it out. This was probably the hardest part of the whole project.

The stencil looks like this. Test it out on some scrap paper before you use it on your leggings. I also made an arrow stencil that I just drew freehand.

I'm a new mama....so I'm a little scatterbrained these days and would only periodically remember to take photos....so we're switching to the arrow leggings now! Between a fussy baby, poop explosions, and 10 loads of laundry this project took me two days to complete....which actually isn't too bad, all things considered!

Anyway, tape your stencil to your leggings in a random pattern and lightly blot the paint on using your stencil brush. The key to working with fabric paint is to use it sparingly. I alternated left and right sides of the pants so as not to accidentally smear the paint with the stencil. Because you are using just a little paint, these dry quickly!

I seriously cannot contain my excitement over how cute they turned out! And no, your eyes are not deceiving you...those are pink pants. Don't worry....I haven't gone off the deep end. I may buy my son leggings in the girls department but I would never make him wear pink ones! They are a gift for my best friend's little girl who is turning one soon and are just too cute not to show off!

Hudson LOVES his deer antler leggings. And I do too. 

Total cost for the leggings ends up being about $5.30 per pair!

One more photo of my little man rocking his arrow leggings. He is going to be the best-dressed kid at daycare!

Make sure to wash the leggings inside out and tumble dry on low. Super easy right? Now I'm on a mission to make more leggings...any suggestions for a new stencil pattern?