This week I’ve been assembling the top for a tee shirt quilt. My cute sister in law spent her entire teaching career at the same elementary school and, now that she is retired she wants to have memories of all those students and experiences.
Can we just take a minute and thank the teachers in our lives? We have several educators in our family and know the time, effort and heart it takes to make a difference in succeeding generations.
ANYWAY, back to my topic this time, Tee Shirt Quilts. I have made several and have some tips, tricks and suggestions that might be helpful.
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I’m coming along with this top and I am impressed with the sashing fabric she picked. It makes all the colors of the squares look really great. I just have rows with the smaller blocks to put on the sides and top and then finish it off with an outside border.
I find that it works for me to use quilting cotton sashing that helps stabilize the knit squares. I realize that some might think it’s heresy, but I don’t use stabilizer at all. I have sewn with knits for clothing for my family since the early 80’s and figured in the beginning that I would see how it worked. I am careful to measure along the sashing and ease the blocks into the space
allowed and have never had any trouble. To be honest, the only time I have had a problem with a t shirt quilt was when a client brought me one to quilt and had used an unsatisfactory stabilizer that pilled, stretched and bunched. I had terrible puckers and pleats and only was able to finish with a glide foot. I know that this may not be everyone’s preferred technique, but it works for me and I want others to know that it’s a viable option.
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This is the first tee quilt I ever made. As you can see, it has many different sizes and shapes of blocks. Arranging the placement was the trickiest part of this construction. Notice that I incorporated the small logos by putting them in groups of 3 or 4. This is a fun way to get all the pieces into the action.
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This one isn’t a tee quilt, but was made using the front of canvas shopping bags from the travels of a military wife. It’s just another possibility to use a memorable collection. They have it hanging on a large wall in their living room to remind them of an adventure in Germany.
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A “techie” who worked a lot of haunted houses requested that I use as much of the XL tee with the skeleton as possible in this quilt. I cut as big as I could and centered it with other shirts around the outside and on the back. I cut the “Cast” and “Crew” sections small and made the blocks the right size by adding Halloween prints.
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A friend began this quilt using just 3 shirts from Billy Joel concerts and couldn’t quite figure how to make it into a lap sized piece, but she had bought a bunch of random fabrics that she liked with different panels. She wanted a horizontal design and I just pieced sections that were the same size to work together.
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This last quilt was done for graduation for a theater kid. I tried to include as many motifs from his shirts as possible. I even included a couple of phrases from the sleeves of his shirts that felt appropriate.
As you can see, cutting the blocks from the shirts in a standard size makes arrangement much easier. I determined the size from a rectangle cut to include the design of the largest motif on a shirt and cut all the rest to match. I just made a space in the top and bottom borders for the smaller sections.
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When I quilt these I usually do different designs in each block, because I like to do it. A nice E2E works well, too. There are so many choices and options to choose from that you can make these cuddly memories personalized and special to the recipient.
— Queen Bee
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Today’s Tip - Creating a Memorable T-Shirt Quilt
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When making a T-shirt quilt, it's essential to preserve the memories associated with each shirt. Prioritize the most significant or sentimental T-shirts for prominent placement in the quilt. Arrange them in a visually appealing way, considering colors and design elements. Add sashing or borders between shirts to provide cohesion and balance to the overall quilt design.
Remember to use a ballpoint or jersey needle on your sewing machine for better results when working with stretchy T-shirt material. Taking these extra steps will help you transform a collection of T-shirts into a cozy and meaningful quilt that preserves the stories and memories behind each shirt.
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