DIY Personalized Baby Hat

When I found out that one of my best friends was having a baby boy, I was elated both for her expanding family and for the chance to finally use my Pinterest board that I'd been adding to for the past few years! I decided to create a simple personalized baby cap with their last name, "Baker". Here's the tutorial below!

Materials needed:

• iron
• ironing board
• baby hat (I ordered the L.L. Bean Organic cotton baby hat online, which is no longer in stock)
• baby's name cut out on a heat transfer**. 

**You can buy custom heat transfers on Etsy OR if you have a Silhouette machine, print out the name onto the heat transfer sheets and peel it off carefully. For a tutorial on how to use Silhouette machine to print out heat transfer cut outs, click here. I don't own a Silhouette machine but I received my heat transfer from a friend who uses her Silhouette to create custom logos for upcycled t-shirt bibs! She had leftover heat transfer material and printed out a few names for me.

Center the heat transfer onto the hat. Make sure that the fuzzy part is facing downwards and that the plastic is on top.

Place a towel on top of the hat and the name, and press firmly with the iron. Hold the iron down for about 5 minutes. I selected the "Cotton" heat setting since the baby hat is made of 100% cotton.

    

 After about 5 minutes, peel off the plastic backing from the fuzzy raised name. Do this slowly and make sure that the letters do not peel off with the plastic sheet. If the letters do not appear adhered to the hat yet and start to bend off of the hat, replace the plastic and the towel and iron for another 5 minutes and try peeling the plastic off again. It's ok if the plastic looks crinkly/melty, as long as it still peels off.

And that's it! The letters are firmly adhered to the cotton hat for a personalized look! Hopefully this means that no babies are accidentally switched in the hospital since it's obviously labeled with Baker. I can't wait to see Baby Baker wearing this blue hat! I recommend hand-washing this to preserve the heat transfer letters, but I've also heard that it holds up well in the washing machine too.