I am a crazy dog & cat lady. And yes, you can be both. I love the holiday season because it’s a perfect excuse to spoil (and accessorize) my fur-babies without all the judgment!
Last year, I did a (somewhat embarrassing) pet photo shoot for our holiday card. I wanted the photos to be comically formal (like “awkward family photos” or Glamour Shots style), so I dressed up and posed poor Andie, Apollo, and Artemis in holiday attire and made velvety backdrop set complete with dog toy props. Here are a few of my favorites:
I still laugh looking at these pictures; they’re so awkward and adorable!
This year, I wanted to make the dogs something to break-in my new Cricut Maker machine (an early Christmas present!) I was originally going to make two bandanas, one “Naughty” and one “Nice” to dress up the dogs accordingly, depending on their behavior at the time haha. Then I thought to make two identical bandanas that were reversible with “Naughty” on one side and “Nice” on the other side.
I made these bandanas using fabric scraps and other materials that I already had at home so they were essentially free!
This project was really simple and the bandana’s turned out so cute!
Check out the tutorial below. Happy crafting!
DIY Reversible Holiday Dog Bandana
Supplies:
- solid-colored fabric (I used red)
- printed fabric (I used a green & white botanical print)
- iron-on adhesive
- heat-transfer vinyl (I used white Siser EasyWeed)
- thread (optional)
Instructions:
- Cut a square from your solid-colored fabric to be your actual bandana. I cut a 19″x19″ square for my medium-sized (50-60lb) Pit Bull mixes, but I like to fold down the top a few times before tying bandanas onto my pups. My 19″ square would probably accommodate a much larger dog as well. If you’re not sure how big to make your square, use your dog’s collar as a guide for the length of the square’s “diagonal”, just make sure to add a few inches for tying.
- If your fabric frays easily and/or you want a more “finished” look for your bandana, you probably want to hem all the edges of your square. I used a zigzag stitch to add some quirky charm.
- Fold your square in half diagonally and press the seam.
- Create your embellishments in Cricut Design Space. I used a simple image of a dog bone and duplicated it until I had 8 bones.
- Cut a piece of your printed fabric from which to cut the bones. Then cut a piece of iron-on adhesive of the same size. Follow the instructions for your adhesive to iron it onto the back of your printed fabric.
- Load your printed fabric on your adhesive cutting mat. I found that placing it backing side up on my fabric-cutting mat worked well. You may also be able to place it backing side down on a non-fabric mat, but I didn’t try that. Set your material according to your fabric type (I used “medium fabric”) and load your Cricut with the rotary blade. Then load your mat and let the Cricut work it’s magic!
- Create your text. I wrote “naughty” and “nice” in a script font and scaled them to about 4″ width to fit on my bandana.
- Cut a piece of heat-transfer vinyl for your text and place it shiny side down on your adhesive cutting mat. Make sure you set your image to “mirror” and select “iron-on” as the material.
- Load your mat and allow your Cricut to cut the text. Once the cutting is finished remove your HTV from the mat and weed. Now all your embellishments are ready for assembly!
- Position your text on one side of your folded bandana. I centered mine horizontally but not vertically. Because I like to fold down the top a few times for tying, I didn’t want any embellishments near the top of my bandana. Follow your HTV instructions to iron-on the text. I used parchment paper and pressed the text for about 15 seconds, then removed the clear backing and pressed for another 10 seconds.
- Position your bones around the bandana whichever way looks good to you. Make sure you peeled off the paper backing from the iron-on adhesive. Then follow the instructions for your iron-on adhesive to apply your bones. I pressed the iron over each bone for about 15 seconds.
- Repeat these steps to add the text and bones to the other side of your bandana.
Here’s the finished product! My girls were not in the mood to model their bandanas so I didn’t get great photos but I’ll update this post if we snap better photos of them on Christmas Day!
Crafting with KC 