Quilted Plum

T-shirt Quilt Tutorial -Part 1

On my design wall is a finish instead of a work in progress. That's right, I finished the t-shirt rag quilt I have been sharing. All I have left to do is to run the lint roller over it to pick up all those stray strings that appear when the quilt is washed to get that "rag" look. 2 of the 3 flannels in this one are woven rather than printed and those are usually really stringy. Perfect to achieve that rag look but very linty, messy in the washer and dryer!

 Last week, I mentioned doing a tutorial on how to make a quilt like this. I spent an hour or more preparing one, I saved it in my typepad drafts....and then....IT DISAPPEARED!!!  So after recovering from this particular frustration, I will try again. This post will be several entries long.

 After you have decide on how you want to arrange the shirts, number them in order. It is very easy to get them out of order because they will be handled several times before you are ready to piece them together.

 Cut a piece of interfacing to stabilize the t-shirt about 2" wider and 2" longer than the size you intend to cut the block. I use Pellon Shape Flex fusible interfacing.

 

 

 

Fuse the interfacing to the back of the t-shirt either by using a steam press or a steam iron. Be sure to only press from the back side. Some of the silk screening on the shirts can smear when touched with a hot iron. If you need to press the front side be sure to use a pressing cloth. If you are using a iron to fuse, lift and press rather than moving the iron around on top of the interfacing. It tends to wrinkle or fold up if you are not careful. If you do happen to get any gunk on your iron either from the shirts or the interfacing, it can easily be cleaned off using hot iron cleaner. You can buy that at most any fabric store, it comes in a tube. You squirt a little on a thick cloth and then carefully wipe the hot iron. It smokes and stinks a bit but it works great!

 

 

Use a large square ruler and rotary cutter, and cut out the blocks. Don't forget to allow for your 1/4" seam allowance and keep motifs inside of that boundary. Sometimes I will use two or more shirts with smaller motifs on one block.

I always get excited when I get to this point in the process because the t-shirts actually start to look like blocks for a quilt now. They are all stabilized and square now!

I usually lay out the blocks as I get them cut so I can check to make sure everything is working out the way I planned.

Next they will be either sashed or framed, but this post is already plenty long so I will share that in my next post.

If you are still reading-thanks and have a great day!

Tracy

Design Wall Monday 2/18/11

My design wall doesn't really look that much different than last week, but the part that seems the slowest to me is done now.  Cutting the shirts apart, then deciding the arrangement, fusing the stablizer to the back of each shirt, and the cutting of the blocks to size. Since there are so many shirts to fit into this quilt, I made the blocks all the same width but varied the height of the rows. That way I was able to fit in an extra row of blocks. Its a little extra work and requires a little extra thought but worht it I think. This is going to be a queen size quilt.

 A couple years ago I bought a small steam press because I've been making 8 to 12  t-shirt quilts a year. It really does help speed up the process and I have been thinking of buying a larger one. As I was working on this quilt, I discovered the part on the handle that you squeeze to make it steam broke. It does not look broken but nothing happens when you squeeze it. I'm bummed, I was thinking of trying to sell this one on ebay but now I can't since it is broken. It has steamed quite a few t-shirts and was pretty inexpensive. I wasn't sure I really needed one of these so I went the cheap route, now I'm not sure I'd want to make a t-shirt quilt without one.

These are the fabrics that the client brought to use on this project. They are flannels which is ideal for a rag quilt. I have had a few questions about doing a t-shirt quilt as a rag quilt, so I plan to do a tutorial this week.

 

I'll close this post with a couple client quilts that I quilted this week.  These are both throw size, aren't they fun?

Tracy

 

Design Wall Monday 4/11/11

On my design wall this week is another t-shirt quilt for a client whose daughter is graduating this Spring. Lots of shirts to fit into this one so I need to spend some more time tweaking the arrangement to get them to all fit in. Besides t-shirts, there are a few other special items like a baby outfit, a favorite pair of jeans, and a jacket. This one is going to be a "rag" quilt. I have made many t-shirt quilts and a handful of them have been rag quilts, meaning the seams will be on the outside of the quilt and then  they are clipped to give them a fringed edge. I will try to share the finished quilt when I get it done.

Speaking of finishes, I did get finished quilting the embroidered quilt that I was working on last week. The sun was going down when I tried it on my bed so the picture has some funky lighting going on. I have lots of handwork to do on the binding but I was anxious to see it how looked on the bed. It looks good I think but I'm not sure how we will get along with this very white quilt! It will be nice to be able to enjoy this quilt instead of having the top the UFO (UnFinished Objects) pile! Now I just need to get that binding done....

 Tracy

 

For me, for me!

  Several years ago my mother-in-law gave me a set of blocks that she embroidered. I sewed them together and set them aside until I had time to quilt something for myself. Well, in typical fashion as they say-the cobbler's children go shoeless..or something like that. It didn't get quilted and then we got our new  bed which is a Cal. King instead fo a queen. My mil was kind enough to embroider a few more blocks for me after I hunted down some more and begged her to ;> .... I made a plan to make them fit my bed with a nice wide plan border for pretty quilting, sewed it all together.....And more time passes until this week when I said ENOUGH and decided to quilt a big quilt FOR ME!!! I took these pictures on Thursday  morning but then quilted some more instead of blogging about it and continued to quilt on Friday. I thought I might get it finished but Mr. Plum needed me to prepare a couple quotes for upcoming jobs, so I didn't quite make it. I have about an hours worth of quilting left and then a few miles of binding to do. I'm excited to see the end of this project, its been a slow one!

 Tracy

 

It Sprung!

Finally! This is what the lake looked outside my window this morning. The ice is finally almost  gone. I think that means that Spring has Sprung!

 

 

 

 

After the the strong winds of Sunday and Monday Iowa Lake has gone from looking like this on Sunday .....

to the above open water picture of this morning. Green grass and boats on the water  can't be far behind! I can hardly wait!

Design Wall Monday 4/4/11

The return of the design wall Monday .....after a far to long absence.....sorry:{0

So,I thought I would share the quilt that I have been helping daughter Emily with this past week.  She made a number of quilts when she was in 4H and became quite confident at quiltmaking but hasn't done much sewing since she graduated.

 

 

 

 

 

With a little guidance from me, she made this cute little quilt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We decided to use a pink minkee fabric on the back because, she loves soft fabric. I love the way the quilting shows up on it! I did some freehand quilting overall. We think it turned out really cute!

Have a great week!

Tracy