T-Shirt Quilt Tutorial - Gail Pickens-Barger

And while we are on the subject of t-shirt, turn your t-shirt collection into a quilt! Above is a dance t-shirt quilt that I did for one of my daughters. I took her dance t-shirts, and basically cut the fronts/backs into same sized quilt blocks.

But before I cut the t-shirts into quilt blocks, I backed the shirts with fuseable interfacing, to have a bit more strength to them. Then used a plastic square for my guide, used my olfa cutter and mat and clear ruler, plastic square and cut out the blocks.

I used the techniques listed in Nancy Johnson-Srebro's book Rotary Magic book, for cutting out the strips that I put in between my quilt blocks.

I also used her techniques in binding the quilt (and my Mom's techniques too).

Here is a link to the craft stylish website, that allows you to put together a t-shirt quilt with non-square t-shirt logos. Be sure to take a good look at that site, if you have non-square t-shirt blocks to put together for a t-shirt quilt. Gail Pickens-Barger
http://www.craftstylish.com/item/45413/how-to-make-an-out-of-the-ordinary-t-shirt-quilt-part-one

and part two of the t-shirt quilt tutorial: http://www.craftstylish.com/item/45990/how-to-make-an-out-of-the-ordinary-t-shirt-quilt-part-two

p.s. The other quilt pictured here, was one I made for Stanley School in Victoria, Texas. Took old t-shirts for the quilt, donated by teachers and students. It was a remembrance quilt, in that the students were moving to Chandler elementary school. This was part of a fund raiser for the PTA/School. Made pillows also, with the t-shirt fronts that didn't fit into the quilt.

P.s.S. Getting ready to do another batch of T-shirt quilts.  Here is a new website about it.  An Aggie T-shirt
quilt.   http://craftsbyabby.blogspot.com/2009/04/t-shirt-quilt-tutorial-planning.html 

enjoy!!!

T-shirt into a Square Flanged Envelope Pillow Tutorial

Tutorial for T-shirt Pillow: A Square Flanged Envelope Pillow Tutorial from a

T-shirt. By Gail Pickens-Barger, http://love2sew4fun.blogspot.com/

What you will need

Size Adult L - T-shirt (or larger)
14 " square pillow form
Matching or contrasting Thread
Sewing Machine
Pins
Sizzors

1. Cut up the sides of the t-shirt.

2. Cut a 19 inch by 19 inch square from the front of the T-shirt.

3. Cut two(2) 19 inch by 13 inch panels from the back of the T-shirt (see photo), this will make the envelope portion of the back of the finished pillow. One of the panels, I used the edge/bottom of the T-shirt, so that I do not have to sew an edge on one of the panels.

4. On one of the 19 by 13 inch panels, sew 1/4 inch from the edge, on the long end. Then turn 1/4 inch, sew again, turn once more 1/4 inch and sew the 1/4 from the edge. Or finish the edge with your favorite technique. (see Photo)

5. Pin the two back pieces to the front piece, RIGHT SIDES TOGETHER (see photo). Place the panel with the t-shirt hem first, then place the panel that you sewed the edge second, having the hemmed edges overlapping. (The t-shirt hem will be on the outside of the finished t-shirt pillow.)


6. Stitch All around the pillow with a 1/2 inch seam allowance. Cut corners diagonally. Trim the seam allowances.

7. Turn RIGHT SIDE OUT. Press. (T-shirt hem is the outer layer, as show in this photo.) ====>

8. To make flange, stitch 2 inches from the outer edges. (You may want to use contrasting thread or stick with a matching thread.)


9. Insert 14" pillow form thru back opening.


10. There you have your square flanged envelope pillow.

Notes: The Larger the t-shirt size, the more room you'll have to center the design into the square. This particular shirt was very close to the neckline, so the design is not "centered" on the square pillow.

New Notes:  For the first shirt in this series, the t-shirt design was not centered vertically.  That was because the design  was very close to the neckline.  On the second series of making the shirt, I  added a 2.5 inch strip to the top of the shirt, to allow for better centering of the shirt design.


T-shirt into a Square Flanged Envelope Pillow Tutorial by Gail Pickens-Barger is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at love2sew4fun.blogspot.com.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://love2sew4fun.blogspot.com/2009/04/t-shirt-into-square-flanged-envelope.html.

Finally made it to the fabric store...

Yeah, had my JoAnne's Coupons with me. I bought Lite Steam-a-Seam 2 1/4 inch size, and Lite Steam-A-Seam 2 in 1/2 inch size.

Tammy (Izzie) did a t-shirt tutorial (which will eventually get up on this blog), and showed me the wonders of self fabric binding on the neckline, and using Lite Steam-A-Seam for my sleeves and shirt bottom hem. Oooo, I got to use the serger too. Preety Scarry.

Here are the patterns that I bought.
Simplicity 2711, 2712, 2707, 3513, 4206, 5695, 5982, & 7189 .. the objective was, okay cheap patterns, plus looking at varied styles of capri pants.

All those pants I made for Grace have really come in handy. Especially now that she is starting potty training!

gaileee