Perhaps I can solicit other orders in our area, there must be dozens of greeks and jocks at the local college with dresser drawers overflowing with t shirts that they would like made into a memento of collegiate days. It is so exciting to open the box of shirts and contemplate different layouts, which leads to the nervousness of them cutting apart (after all, you can't put them back together), and gradually progressing to a neatly finished top. Next I will piece the backing and roll each part onto the frame and slowly quilt it all together. A contrasting binding and a small label on the back will result in folding the completed project into a box and mailing it back to the sender. It must seem almost miraculous from the other end, sending a box of old shirts and receiving a warm colorful bed covering with memories from past years gracing the cover. I'm happy to be quilting again, especially with enough room to spread a project out on the floor to admire my efforts.
2 comments:
I should make one of these for my son but out of his CAP t-shirts. He has a couple dozen. He gets one at every single activity (encampment, flight school etc...) the one from flight academy and the one from Cadet Officer School are all signed by fellow cadets and the one from flight academy is especially significant as it is a memento of his first solo. I'm a bit intimidated by the semi-stretchy t-shirt fabric though.
There is a well written book by a Maryland quilter on how to make these quilts. Basically you measure the designs, find a pattern so all the blocks in each row or column are the same (this latest quilt the columns were almost all 14" wide), iron on some med weight interfacing on the back, mark the shirts and sew on the sashing on the lines before cutting the rest of the shirt away. This way you sew along a pretty stable material. The difference between this woman's technique/design is the ability to use shirts of many different sizes, rather than making all the blocks the same size.
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