As I was getting ready for college, I realized two things: one, I had too many t-shirts. Two, I loathed parting with said T-shirts. Here's how to keep those well-worn memories fun and useful.
So there you are, commemorate life events without donating or throwing out your past.
By Sarah
I'm looking for advice on making a T-shirt quilt using polar fleece. My daughter is thinking we can fuse the back of t-shirts, sew them to a fleece square, then tie the squares together for one side, then tie that side to the backing. Any ideas if this will work?
By Marcy from NE
By redhatterb03/07/2010Why not just cut the front of the t-shirts off and just sew the front to the square of fleece. I have seen pictures of quilts where the squares are tied together, but they have used different materials. My thought is that the t-shirts might be more stretchable than the fleece, and you could end up with something that gets out of shape.
Different t-shirts also have a different amount of stretch. I have seen where people make quilts out of t -shirts but they just use the fronts of the tee shirts cut into squares and sewed together and then proceed like for any quilt. If this is because your daughter wants to use some of her t-shirts in a quilt for keepsakes, I have used some of my daughters t-shirts and made throw pillows out of them. I cut the front and back parts into the size square that I want and sew them together, leaving one end open in order to either insert a pillow form or to stuff it with fiber fill and then sew the open end up.
How would you make a t-shirt quilt?
By georgie300 from Waco, TX
By MrsAshleyO04/27/2011Here are the basic steps I followed to make mine (also I'm no seamstress so the terminology isn't going to be right):
1) Find the shirt with the biggest pattern / section that you want to keep in one piece and draw a square on a piece of cardboard that is about an inch larger than the design on all sides.
2) Using that cardboard square, draw squares on the wrong side of the other T-shirt pieces and cut so you have a stack of squares. (I used a few 'front' sides also if I needed some to fill in or just liked them for whatever reason.
3) Lay the sections out on the floor to see what looks good. Make sure you don't put two white squares together, etc.
4) Sew them together one row at a time using 1" seam allowance (or whatever seam allowance you like) and then sew the rows together in the same manner.
(Disclaimer: I'm a little bit fuzzy on exactly how the rest went because it was awhile ago, but I think these instructions are right:)
5) If you are using batting, cut batting to the size of the quilt and sew around the edges. You may need to use two pieces. You should just sew around the edges at about 1/4" seam allowance. ( I actually don't remember using multiple pieces so I must have had batting that was as wide as the quilt).
6) Sew together fabric that will make up the underside of the quilt (if necessary) and cut fabric so that you have one large section of fabric that 1" larger than the t-shirt section on all sides
7) Press 1/2" hem around the underside fabric (folded in towards wrong side).
8) Lay the underside fabric wrong side up (so you see the raw edges of the hem). Lay the t-shirt section right side up on top, centered (a measuring thingy will help). Then fold fabric edges to make a border and sew in place as close to the edge of the hem as possible ( so about 1/2" from edge of quilt).
The seam allowances are approximate, you may want a larger or smaller border... it might be easier without the border but I think it looks nice. The rest of the quilt is pretty simple, no fabric in between the t-shirts or anything but that could be added pretty easily as well. I love mine. Good luck!
I would live to learn how to make a t-shirt quilt. I have all the materials that are called for "except" a sewing machine. at this time I am unable to afford one. Can anyone explain step by step how to make one by hand; no machine please?
By Melonie S.
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Making a T-shirt Quilt Using Polar Fleece