Monday, September 14, 2009

Mail Delivery: Silly Shirt Shop Review

Big sister E likes clothes and has her opinions on what she wears. Fortunately for me, I can still steer her in a certain direction when she's getting dressed and have so far not let her leave the house in anything too wild and crazy. I can't say the same when Daddy dresses her, of course, and sometimes if the two of them are heading to the grocery store and he lets her pick out whatever she wants to wear, the end result is something along the lines of a clashing, color-blind mess. But I figure that if I'm not going to be seen in public with them and my husband doesn't care, then why not? I usually just shrug and tell them to have a good time. And to not let her eat too many snacks while they shop.

I was recently introduced to a new t-shirt company, Silly Shirt Shop, and, as soon as I saw the shirt, I knew Big Sister E would enjoy it.


The unique thing about these shirts? Right on Silly Shirt Shop's website, you are able to design the character on the front to look just like your child, as well as personalize the saying underneath. How much fun is that? Usually when there are people on clothing, you usually have to settle for maybe matching some of their characteristics, but not with these shirts.


Want to make a shirt that is like looking in the mirror for the child in your life? Silly Shirt Shop allows you to do just that. Let me tell you, I thought I was just going to browse through the website, maybe create a character or two... Hours later I was still playing around, having designed a virtual group of friends that ranged from sporty to friendly to punk. Too much time on my hands? You just wait until YOU try it.

So how exactly does the design process at Silly Shirt Shop work?

Step 1: Choose your profile. Right now the available options are girl or boy. In the future, you will also be able to create baby girl, baby boy, toddler girl, toddler boy, dog or cat. Along with these individual characters, you will have the opportunity to design a shirt with multiple kids on it, something that I think is a really fun idea for best friends or siblings. What a fun gift idea to make a I'm The Little Bro/Sis onesie and a I'm The Big Bro/Sis shirt for when a new baby is arriving that actually look like them!

Step 2: Choose your skin color. There are four different shades of skin to pick from, ranging from light to dark.

Step 3: Choose your hairstyle and color. The choices already start to get big with this one. Picking from the four different colors of hair is fairly easy - red, blond, brown and black - but the hairstyles! For both boys and girls, there are 12 different hairstyles! Whatever you are looking for, whether short, long, curly, straight, pigtails, bangs... they're all there. Once you're finished being a hairdresser, you get to choose from blue, green, brown or black for the eye color.

Step 4: Choose your outfit. 14 for girls! There are casual clothes like jeans and skirts and tops to cute dress-up selections like a princess, a super girl or a cheerleader. Boys have 19 outfit choices! As well as a bunch of cute shirts and pants, they can be anything from an astronaut to a cowboy to a soccer player.

This was definitely one of my favorite steps. This allows you to decide to create your character to look like your child in everyday life or dress them up straight from their imagination. Does your son love hockey? Now he can have a shirt showing himself in a hockey outfit to show off all the time!

Step 5: Choose your accessories. Oh boy. This, after having finally decided on what clothes to wear. For girls, there are 4 styles of glasses, 5 hair clips, 3 handbags, 7 pairs of earrings... and that doesn't include the category of Outfit Add Ons so that she can be holding a doll that looks like herself or a rock star guitar. There are 8 headwear options including hats, headbands and tiaras. Options of items she can hold in her hands include magic wands, a teddy bear or an ice cream cone. Boys don't have quite as many choices, but there is still a nice variety of fun things to pick from to finish creating your little man.

Step 6: Add a caption under your character. You have up to 18 letters and spaces and the creativity is up to you. Your child's name? Nickname? Birthday Boy? Grandma's Princess? You get to decide!

Step 7: Select the size and style of shirt. Again with the options! There are 6 different shirt styles that range in size from a toddler 2T up to a youth XL. If you have a girl in your life who likes her clothes more feminine, there are girls' ruffle edge shirts available to make things extra fancy for her. The shirts cost between $22 and $28.

Step 8: Order, sit back and wait for your shirt to arrive. Then watch your child enjoy!

In the end, I had a lot of fun (maybe too much) on Silly Shirt Shop. For being a new website, I was impressed with all of the details that they have to offer. I wouldn't have thought of choosing to match the color of the character's eyebrows to their hair or leave them dark or being able to pick whether a hair clip goes on the left or the right, but they allow you to do so and I appreciated that. My main criticism of the site was that when you are finished creating your character and, if you are like me and VERY indecisive, you click the back button on your browser to change something, you are brought all the way back to the beginning. Of course, this just gave me a reason to start playing again...

Me.
I think I look pretty good.
And yes, that IS an ice cream cone in my hand and I am STILL in my pajamas, THANKS.


Thanks, Silly Shirt Shop, for providing Big Sister E a fun shirt to wear, she thought it was pretty cool that she was on it. And, for folding the padded envelope neatly into the mailbox for us to discover, bring inside and tear open, thanks, Mail Carrier.

(Other than the sample shirt that I was sent, I was not provided with anything or enticed to do this review in any way. This review is solely my opinion of this website and their products.)

11 comments:

Theta Mom said...

Great review!!! I never heard of them before and it really is personalized to what you want. Awesome!

Unknown said...

Very cute! My little bit would love that!

Stopping by from MBC!

Jackie said...

so cute! thanks for sharing - i had never heard of them before :)

Mandee said...

How cute!!! :)

Janie B said...

Very clever business. Thanks for reviewing and sharing. Mmmm... I wonder if my grandson would like a new shirt????

Helene said...

That looks like such a fun website!!! I bet my kids would get a kick out of seeing their "cartoon" picture on a shirt!

Love the pic of your daughter looking at her shirt in the mirror!

Alex said...

Thanks for the follow! I totally understand your love for the mail carrier. I love seeing them come to my house! When my husband put me on shopping restriction I was so sad to see the delivery people go to other houses :-(

Reyna Meinhardt said...

Your blog is adorable! I found it on MBC and am now following! I also love getting mail :)

Samantha Gianulis said...

that is a cool, fun gift idea. i can think of only 500 sayings to be put on my girls shirts. i am sure once i visit the website i will have come up with far too many more...

Jessica AKA Falling Glitter said...

That is the cutest shirt I have ever seen!

You have an award waiting for you on my blog!

http://ridingwithjessica.blogspot.com/2009/09/one-lovely-blog-blog-award.html

Unknown said...

The characters on the shirts are so cute.

knickgirl_3 at yahoo dot com