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Hello! I know that decorating backpacks seems silly right now (on account of there not being school), but this is for a good cause! If I can do any good while I’m at home, it helps me feel like I’ve spent this time as well as I can. Plus, this is a great activity to do with kids! Or you can save this idea for the fall when, hopefully, school is back in session.
the blue ribbon project
I’m decorating these backpacks to donate to The Blue Ribbon Project. They’re a non-profit organization based in Maryland who supports kids in Foster Care. Growing up, my family did foster care for a few years. It was challenging, but this cause is near to my heart because of the impression it made on me when I was young.
There are around 440,000 kids in Foster Care in the US. Usually, when children enter Foster Care, it’s an emergency situation where they only have the clothes on their back. Or a few belongings in a trash bag.
Of course you can see why donating backpacks is a much needed item for kids entering Foster Care! I think it’s a small way to help provide comfort during a hard time. Plus it’s fun to decorate them!
The Blue Ribbon Project provides a list of items needed for each child, specific to their age and gender. I’m creating a rainbow backpack for an 11-12 year girl and a dinosaur backpack for a 4-5 year old boy (the lists of items needed for each group are linked).
These packs are designed for those first 24 to 48 hours children are taken into Foster Care and travel size items work nicely. I’m hoping a few of you see this project and decide to donate too! Keep reading to see how I decorated my two backpacks.
Note, The Blue Ribbon Project has asked for all donations to be postponed until April 10th due to the organization taking necessary health and safety precautions. I’ll be sending my backpacks packed with the items on the above linked checklists then.
decorating backpacks tutorial
SUPPLIES
- Cricut Everyday Iron-On– I used blush, yellow, green-apple, Kelly, bright teal, sky
- Backpack– I got Jade and White
- Cricut Explore Air 2
- Cricut Mat
- Weeding Tool, scissors, burnish tool
- Cricut EasyPress mini
- Felt
step 1 create the design
Start by designing what you want to cut out on Cricut Design space. I used images in the Cricut Image Library and saved my design here if you want to do exactly what I did.
To make your own designs, search the Cricut library and insert the images you want to use. Resize the images as needed. I kept a measuring tape and the backpack next to my computer so I could easily figure out what would fit and size accordingly.
I changed the color on each item as I imported the image so I knew what color of iron-on I wanted each piece to be cut out on. That way, when it was time for cutting, all the pink items (and green items and yellow items, etc.) are grouped together so they can be cut together.
Once I was happy with the color and size of everything, I duplicated each item until I had the quantity I wanted.
Click Make It at the top of the canvas to continue the process.
step 2 print the design
Next, put the iron-on vinyl on the mat. I opened each mat on the preview screen to know how big I needed to cut each piece of vinyl. This way, there was very little waste. I put two colors on iron-on vinyl on the mat at once so that when one side was cut, I could just flip the mat and continue cutting efficiently.
I laid the iron-on face down (shiny side down ) on the mat when cutting it to the correct size. This is very important!!! The front of iron-on is the plastic backing so you want to make sure to cut on the back where the actual iron-on material is.
Before cutting, make sure to mirror each image. This flips the image and is extremely important to do if you’re printing words. With my design, it didn’t really matter. But for words, make sure to toggle over on the mirror setting or else you’ll get backwards letters/pattern.
Set the dial on the Cricut Explore to “iron-on.” This will tell your machine how deep to cut the pattern. Don’t skip this! Then, press the “C” on your machine to begin the cutting process.
step 3 weed out the design
And now, since the design is cut, it’s time to weed the iron-on vinyl. This is when you remove all the vinyl that’s not part of the design. Start in one corner and dig the tip of the weeding tool into the vinyl (as long as you don’t dig into the design). Then pull the vinyl off with your fingers. Use the weeding tool again if you need to get into any tight spots.
After the excess vinyl is weeded out, cut the plastic vinyl into individual pieces. For example, I cut the rainbow above apart from the two dinosaurs so that I could iron them on separately.
step 4 adhere iron on vinyl
Finally, it’s time to adhere the vinyl to the backpack. For this, I’m suing a Cricut Mini EasyPress, but you could also use an iron. To prep, I put rags in the pockets and inside of the backpack. This gives you a small “ironing board” and protects the surface you’re ironing on.
Now, to adhere the vinyl, set the Mini EasyPress on the highest setting. Press the backpack for 5-10 seconds to help flatten the surface you’re working on which also begins the adhesion process.
Next, iron the design directly onto the plastic. Hold the EasyPress down for 15-30 seconds Then pick it up and move it if the image is larger than the iron or EasyPress (like my rainbow is).
Once the decal has cooled down, peel back the plastic sheet from the image. If the vinyl is adhered to the backpack and the plastic comes up easily, you’re in good shape! If it is stilly sticking or pulling up, put the plastic down and apply more heat.
step 5- diy iron on patch
On the rainbow backpack, I really didn’t like the black label. To cover it up, I thought it’d be fun to make my own iron on patch. You could always buy one, but I wanted to use what I had from home and try it out! Another alternative would be to just iron vinyl over the label.
To make my own iron-on patch, I cut out a piece of felt that was the same size as the label.
Then, I wrote my words “you are magic” in pencil and started embroidering the letters with the backhand stitch.
Once the words were done, I filled in the blank space with blue yarn. In hind site, I wish I had stitched over the felt and then added the words. Because the words kind of got lost, I had to go back over them again.
The label didn’t turn out perfectly, but I love the handmade touch it gave the backpack. To adhere it, I used hem tape.
First, I cut a few pieces of the hem tape the same size of the label.
Next, I ironed on the label with a wet rag over the label. This worked like a charm!
after
Here are the backpacks all complete! I love them both for different reasons. The small pattern on the dinosaurs are really fun- my son thinks they are so great.
To me, the rainbow is my favorite. It’s bold and fun. You could always add just that element on a backpack for a fast and super cute punch of color.
Right now, the bags are waiting to be filled and shipped off to The Blue Ribbon Project. I hope that that these are of some comfort to the kids who receive them.
I think these would be so fun to decorate for back to school. Or for a family campout. Or, of course, to give away. Have you ever decorated a backpack? This was a first for me and I loved working on it! Which backpack is your favorite? Let me know in the comments!
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