Off-the-Shoulder T-shirt

This project was inspired by my enthusiasm for UFC and a particular MMA fighter, Georges St-Pierre (GSP).  Yes, it is true and I do not hide it, I like watching cage fighting!  Atypical for a knitter and sewer to enjoy a little violence?  Maybe, but just be sure that you can never judge a book by its cover!  Ha, ha.

If you do not know much about UFC, it stands for Ultimate Fighting Championship and it is a fighting association and MMA stands for Mixed Martial Arts which is a collective term for various styles of martial arts, such as Greco-Roman wrestling, judo, boxing and jujitsu (many more, but you get the idea) combined together to make one sport.

Now, the point of this project is to honor my favorite fighter, GSP.  He is from Montreal, Canada and has been fighting in UFC since 2004.  He is currently the Welterweight champion and every fight he fights, is to defend his title.  In short, he rocks!

Ohh la la!

Anyway, enough ogling over him and back to the project.  Last Saturday night on Pay-Per-View he fought against Jake Shields and he defended his title (although, admittedly, it was a bit boring, but still a good show).  So I wanted to make something with the letters "GSP" on it.  I have been liking the off-the-shoulder style that is retro-ing back from the Flashdance days.

So, I went to a thrift store in Tampa and bought a red t-shirt for $1.50.  With this t-shirt I cut the edges off and trimmed the neckline.


Chopped!


Now, something to keep in mind when you trim the neck to be off-the-shoulder: trim little by little.  Start with trimming the neckline midway on the shoulder (halfway between the neck and the sleeve seam on the shoulder), following the curve of the neck.  Try it on then adjust the one shoulder you want to hang off gradually.  You can cut too much.  You might want to try it on a junk t-shirt first.

For my lettering, I went online and pulled up an alphabet in a font that I envisioned.  It didn't want it to be too fancy because I have to cut them out with scissors.  Once I chose my font, I increased the zoom on the screen to 400%.  I took some tissue paper (not just for gift-wrapping!) and pencil and traced the letter from my computer onto the tissue.  I did this for a G, S, P and a fleur-de-lis.  Since he is French-Canadian and he has a fleur-de-lis tattoo on his calf, I figured I'd go with it.

Trace letters to use as a cutting guide

Once all the letters and symbol were traced, I took a junk t-shirt and pinned the tissue-paper letter to the t-shirt.  I will sew these letters onto the front of the red t-shirt.

Gimme a G!  Go GSP!

I cut along the penciled letter and then repeated it for the other letters and my symbol.  Once they were all cut out I arranged them in different ways to see what would look best.  I just chose the simplest layout.

That fleur-de-lis was a pain to cut out!

I placed the G on the red t-shirt first and pinned it.  I wanted it to look like a varsity jersey with the letters curling after washing to give it a broken-in look.


I sewed just on the inside of the perimeter of the letter

I sewed each letter and the symbol as in my original lay-out and viola!  Fini!


J'aime GSP!

I was still in my pj's when I completed this, so I will model without showing my head (trust me, my hair was a mess)!


Bed shirt or can I wear it in public?


Not sure if I will wear it out anywhere, but it is comfortable and girlie.  Now, does it look like an 8th grade Home Ec project...Yes.  Do I love it anyway...Yes!  I am considering Be-Dazzling it, but not sure.  I will post-script a new pic if I ever get around to it!