As much as I love the core characters, one particular group of Muppets holds a special place in my heart. Of course I’m talking about one of the greatest rock bands in existence – Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. The band originally had five members: Dr. Teeth (obviously) on keys, Janice on lead guitar, Sgt. Floyd Pepper on bass, Zoot on sax and fan-favorite Animal on drums. Five years later, Lips joined the band to play the trumpet.

Are you familiar with the Muppets’ rock band? If not, you need to watch this segment from the original “Muppet Movie.” It’s a classic moment of energetic music and playful comedy from the band in the Muppets that has delighted fans across generations.

The Muppet band members have played a role in over 10 films, and they have over 60 songs to their name. (UPDATE: In 2022, Disney+ announced that these rockstars will even get their own mini-series in 2023 called The Muppets Mayhem!)

As with any band, there are tons of creative Electric Mayhem T-shirts out there for fans. In celebration of the release of the newest Muppet film, I’ve compiled a collection of eight Muppetational T-shirt designs featuring various combinations of Dr. Teeth and The Electric Mayhem members. Whether it’s a colorful ’70s pattern to call back to the origins of this series or the timeless faded aesthetic of vintage music tees, we’re sure that these Electric Mayhem band shirts have earned wearers plenty of compliments from fellow fans. They may not all still be for sale from their original creators or retailers, but check out these Muppets band tees to enjoy some nostalgia!

If these Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem shirts have you wondering what kind of designs you could make with your own logo or artwork, play around with our online Design Studio to preview your unique custom t-shirts!

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“Beware the mundane, the comfortable, the lackluster, or the negative. We are, by nature, brutal with our criticisms of others. We tend to take the microwaveable, quick, and easy approach to life, to problems, to challenges. Step out of your comfort zone. Find your passion.” – Stormi Murtie, The Center for Courageous Kids

Over the past 25 years, custom t-shirts have increasingly become a form of mass communication. Used for advertising and promotion, to show one’s allegiance to a team, or to champion a cause or charity, custom t-shirts give you an opportunity to share your message with everyone you meet.

One of our core values at BlueCotton is to help our customers share their message through quality custom products. When I first met Stormi Murtie, communications director for The Center for Courageous Kids, I didn’t realize that I was meeting an inspirational powerhouse that would help BlueCotton make this core value more tangible.

She told me about the 20 million dollar state-of-the-art medical camping facility in nearby Scottsville, KY, and invited BlueCotton to visit and learn about their mission to provide a “cost-free, safe and fun camping experience for seriously ill and disabled children and their families.”

After touring the grounds, meeting their staff, bowling in their bowling alley, and learning about the kids and families they serve, we knew that BlueCotton had an opportunity and desire to share The Center for Courageous Kids’ message with our nationwide audience of customers and friends.

Stormi was kind enough to sit down with us and answer a few questions about what CCK is all about. Please watch the video above and find out why she is so passionate about her work and why BlueCotton is committed to sharing CCK’s message. You will be as inspired and moved as we were!

Can you describe CCK as if I knew nothing about it?

The Center for Courageous Kids (a.k.a. “CCK”) is a “medical camp”, which means we try to provide what you would think of as “traditional camping experiences” to medically fragile kids. However, to refer to CCK as a “camp” would be like calling Harvard a junior college. A medical camp has a medical center, we need to provide dialysis, chemotherapy, and a plethora of other procedures as well as administer a gazillion medicines throughout the camper’s stay. We ALSO have a ridiculously fun equestrian center, an awesome indoor pool, an honest-to-goodness bowling alley, great food, wheelchair accessible everything – in short, we need to be stellar in every way. These kids have weakened immune systems, so our staff and facility have to kick up the standards and provide over-the-top care, respect, and fun. Additionally, we run year-round – we offer two programs, one program runs for 22 weekends throughout the school year where the entire family can attend with their ill child, and another program in the summer where for 9 weeks we serve 128 kids at a time. It’s an ambitious calendar. This is a pretty magnificent facility and program, costing nearly $20 million to construct, and $3 million a year to operate. And one final mega-important piece of this organizational structure is that we do not charge the campers or their families one penny to attend. They attend FREE OF CHARGE. We run solely on donations, from individuals, businesses, health partners, corporations, and foundations who have a heart for the medically fragile children we serve. That’s a long paragraph of explanation – but the scope and magnitude of what we do here is pretty huge!

If you could have any superpower, what would it be?

What a great question. Hmm. Just one? How about the superpower to bring “bucket lists” to fruition? That moment where you dust off those “things I want to do” lists and actually DO them. If working with these inspirational kids and parents has taught me anything it’s that we have to LIVE the lives we’re given – whatever our shortcomings or challenges. I’d love to take your hand and read your mind enough to say “I see you’ve always wanted to go skydiving. What’s stopping you? Let’s go!”

Tell us about your favorite t-shirt – where did it come from? Why is it your favorite?

I asked our friends at BlueCotton to design a t-shirt in memory of our Founder, Ms. Betty. What they created was so perfect, it just made me cry.

What will CCK be like 10 years from now?

We opened in February 2008 and have served 10,000 kids and family members from 31 states and Canada thus far. I can only imagine how that figure will have “blown up” in the next ten years. I anticipate we will have the same stellar focus on the kids we serve, the same fiscal responsibility, the dedicated staff of professionals, and the hundreds of annual volunteers who dedicate their time and talents to CCK. What I also anticipate I will see as I survey the 168-acre campus in 10 years, is a forest of trees planted in memory of those campers who have left us too soon.

Name something you carry with you all the time.

Ms. Betty gave me a necklace, it’s an angel holding a small diamond and it represents the “gems” we have here at CCK and the godly work that we do. And it reminds me of her and why we are here, on this piece of land, in her hometown of Scottsville, KY. It also reminds me, every day, to keep dreaming big dreams.

What’s your favorite part of CCK?

That question makes me laugh because when I do a tour, every building I walk into I say “THIS is my favorite building!” I love it all. The land, the work, each program area, our mission, our staff, our focus. This is the real deal. My favorite part of CCK IS CCK. Roger and I stood there with the cows, on this land that was former farmland of Ms. Betty’s daddy. Back then, it was only a dream, and we envisioned all you see now. It began with Ms. Betty asking Roger and me to have a commitment to creating a stellar world-class facility, one of only a hand full of medical camps of this caliber nationwide. To stand back and look at it now, it gives me chills. My favorite part? All of it. Every inch, every blade of grass, every echo of laughter.

What’s the biggest challenge of your work?

It’s always fundraising. To run a quality non-profit, it is a 365 day a year challenge. We are always seeking donors from across the country who believe in the mission of The Center for Courageous Kids and want to invest in the smiles of these brave youngsters. Without them, we could not do what we do.

If you had 30 seconds of airtime on every major network, what would you broadcast?

The power of the press is staggering. Wow. If I had 30 seconds on every major network after I picked myself up off the floor, I think I’d like a camper to speak, and I think I’d just like them to say how they feel about this magical place, while images of them rolling in spaghetti and splashing new friends at poolside and sitting atop a horse are on the screen. And I would hope they would say “please give” and show our website, www.courageouskids.org And maybe folks would see that and go to their computers and check us out, and call us, and visit us, and send their kids to us, and volunteer with us – and from that one 30 seconds, amazing things would happen. That would be cool, right?

The best movie you’ve seen in the last year is:

I wish I could say I’d been to a bunch of movies in the last year, but I have not. Some might call me a workaholic. I did however recently rent “The Help” which I liked very much.

Anything else you’d like to add?

Beware the mundane, the comfortable, the lackluster, or the negative. We are by nature brutal with our criticisms of others. We tend to take the microwaveable, quick, and easy approach to life, to problems, to challenges. Step out of your comfort zone. Find your passion.

Find out how you can help!

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This Weekend Project video from Make Magazine demonstrates how you can make your own cheap and effective fire starter known as “Char Cloth.” All you’ll need for this project is an Altoids tin, a source of heat, and an old cotton t-shirt. Watch the video below for complete instructions and to see the “Char Cloth” in action!

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“The Move” is a yet-to-be-released product that allows you to attach your iPhone 4 or iPod Touch anywhere on your clothing without the use of straps, clips, velcro, or magnets. It’s a concept difficult to describe using words alone, so check out this video from the inventors explaining how the product works and for some really cool examples of how it might be used.

As of now, the product is only a prototype and not available for immediate purchase. However, if this idea is something that intrigues you, check out The Move’s Kickstarter page. There you can get a detailed run-down of The Move’s features/uses and even pledge your own money to fund the project and help bring the product to the mass-market.

The post “The Move” Could Let You Wear Your iPhone or iPod Touch appeared first on The BlueCotton Blog.

This video only gives a general overview of the parts and process for the project, so when you’re ready to start building your own (credit jordan here), be sure to check out this PDF for the full list of components and detailed instructions.

The post We Have Lift-Off! Build Your Own T-Shirt Cannon appeared first on The BlueCotton Blog.

As detailed in my previous post, The T-Shirt Lifecycle, some t-shirts inevitably fall out of our rotation for one reason or another. There’s no need to throw such a shirt away! Why not use it to create reusable grocery bag?

For more ways to recycle your old t-shirts, check out our previous post Earth Day 2011: Repurpose Your T-shirts.

The post The T-Shirt Grocery Bag: Say “No” to Plastic & Save Some Cash appeared first on The BlueCotton Blog.

For a more detailed, step-by-step guide to this project, check out the full article: T-Shirt Mod: Boxy to Foxy.

The post Hey, Ladies! Modify Those Shapeless, Unisex Tees Into Something More Flattering [Video] appeared first on The BlueCotton Blog.

Geek idol and modding god, Ben Heck, created his own high-tech t-shirt inspired by the popular video game “Portal” by Valve Software. The project utilizes a small LCD display, a miniature security camera, and a battery pack to create a t-shirt that creates the illusion of having a see-through ‘portal’ on your torso. Check out episode 4 of “The Ben Heck Show” for a full step-by-step breakdown of how he made the shirt.

Chris Ball’s E-mail Counting T-Shirt

Chris Ball, a software developer in Boston, used some electronics he won to build and program his own e-mailing counting shirt. The shirt uses a series of LED lights to display the number of unread e-mails he has in his gmail inbox. Check out his personal blog post about the project. He even provides a link to the source code used to create the shirt for those interested in replicating the idea.

The iShirt Laptop Case

Flickr user, Voxphoto, made this cool laptop case using an old pocket tee. He got the idea from an article in Make magazine, but made a few of his own adjustments to perfect the concept.

The post 3 Super-Geeky DIY T-Shirt Projects appeared first on The BlueCotton Blog.

Pretty neat, huh? Now AR technology is making it’s way to t-shirts in a variety of applications. The WWF (World Wildlife Fund) recently did a campaign in Russia featuring AR-enabled t-shirts that simulated the wearing getting shot. Why? To raise awareness of needless poaching of wild tigers. Check the video about the campaign:

Here’s another example. This shirt appears to project a video on the wearer as seen in this video:

And finally, this video shows a t-shirt with which you can compete in a game of Paper Rock Scissors!

These are just a handful of examples where Augmented Reality is being implemented in t-shirts and other clothing. It’s an exciting technology that will no doubt become more and more impressive as it evolves.

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