Will's T-Shirt Quilt

My friend Emily wanted me to make a T-Shirt quilt for her son graduating high school. Just a small and simple one. So, she sneaked away several of his t-shirts and passed them along to me. 

Now, although I have quilted several t-shirt quilts, it has been a while since I have actually made one myself. After a few conversations with my quilt clients, I had a plan of attack! The first issue was how to cut out these shirts. They stretch and contort so easily! And the biggest square ruler I have is 12.5 inches. So, what I did was to take a piece of poster-board and cut it 18 inches square. Then, I made a 15 inch window centered inside of it by measuring 3 inches from the edge and cutting it with my rotary cutter and long ruler. Now I could place it on top of the shirt and center the design. I used a chalk pencil or water soluble marker to carefully outline a 15 inch square on the shirt, then used scissors to cut the shirts out. It was so quick and easy! I had all 12 shirts cut out in 30 minutes.  

After you cut out your interfacing at 15 inches square and iron them onto the backs, trim them up again to 14.5 inches square. Now they are much easier to work with and won't stretch and contort on you so much. I used the markings on my cutting mat for this part. My sashing was cut 2.5 inches wide. 

For the quilting I used a gray thread and did an all-over freestyle, along with outlining the shirt designs, adding stars to the black cornerstones, and a few fun designs in the large blank spaces. The red binding was attached by my domestic sewing machine using a walking foot.

This one block was made with three shirts. Bonus!

I told Emily to purchase a large fuzzy throw blanket to use for the backing. She got it on sale, being springtime and all. Score! The red and black match the quilt perfectly and it will get lots of use for sure with it being so thick and soft. I used Hobbs 80/20 for the batting.

Thanks Emily for the fun project! Also, thanks to my quilt guild friends who helped me with the layout/shirt placement while working on it at our guild retreat. The blacks, reds, and blues are spaced just right! And, Good Luck Will at Iowa State!! Go Cyclones! :)