Let’s Create a Memory Quilt

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Do you collect t-shirts from events and/or vacation spots? What do you do with them? Wear them or keep them in a drawer? Many people tend to keep their special t-shirts in a drawer so they don’t fade by being worn and washed. Instead of keeping them in a drawer or risk wearing them out by actually wearing them, there is another alternative to enjoy them….you can make a Memory Quilt. Whether the t-shirts come from childhood, your kids’ sports games, concerts or places you’ve traveled to, this is a great way to use and display your collection of t-shirts. At the same time, it will be keeping your heart, soul, and body warm with comforting and loving memories.

*****This is quite a long post and well worth reading (in my humble opinion)….however, if you are short on time and just want the bullet points, head on over to this post….don’t forget to come on back here when you have more time or are ready to create a Memory quilt of your own!

Recently, my sister-in-law contacted me to see if she could hire me to create a Memory Quilt from t-shirts she and her hubby had collected over the years of traveling around the globe. I’ve made quilts in the past and had created one of these memory quilts for hubby using t-shirts he had collected over the years from softball tournaments, so I said Yes!

I sent her a picture of the rag style t-shirt quilt I made for hubby. Rag quilts get their name because of the fuzzy frayed seam allowances that show on the right side of the quilt. She responded that she was thinking of a different style and sent back a picture to show me what she had in mind. It was a quilt with clean-finished seams and a sashing between the t-shirts.

While I had most of the sewing supplies that I needed to create this quilt, I did pick up some quilting safety pins – they are curved on one side – and a walking foot. I haven’t used a walking foot when making a quilt before and, boy, did it make a big difference in how easily the fabric moved through the machine!

Sewing notions

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To begin the process of making a t-shirt quilt, you will need to cut the design from each of the t-shirt. It is helpful if the t-shirts are the same size, or close to the same size so the pieces will be uniform in size. Before mailing the t-shirts to me, my sis did the cutting and used iron-on interfacing to add strength to the shirts. She also bought a set of king-size sheets to be used for the sashing, edging and backing of the quilt. This was really helpful!

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The box arrived with the t-shirts, sheet set, a lovely letter & a pattern layout so I would have a reference while working with the quilt – I used this guide a lot! Sis had also sent a picture of the t-shirts laid out as a reference. The first step for me was to find the smallest t-shirt and then cut the rest of the shirts to that size. The t-shirts were all a similar size, so this process just ensured the dimensions were the same.

Squaring up the t-shirts

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The standard size ended up being 13 1/4″ x 15 1/2″. Sis had estimated the size of the quilt to be 104″ x 106″ give or take. With the size of the blocks, including the 1″ spacing of the sashing & 1/4″ seam allowances, the finished quilt was going to be roughly 67″ wide by 79″. Now I knew that my edging would need to be at least 30″. Once I had my measurements, I started cutting out the edging pieces. They would be the width or length of the t-shirt depending on which side they would be sewn to. I decided to start cutting the fabric needed from the fitted sheet. Before working with the fitted sheet, I cut off the elastic and ironed the sheet to remove the wrinkles then cut out the pieces I would need for the edging.

Since it had been a while since I had made a large quilt (other than the rag style for hubby), I did some research on techniques to make it less bulky while sewing. The process that I am familiar with is to sew your quilt pieces together to create the top of your quilt & then ‘sandwich a layer of batting between that layer and the material you are using for the back of the quilt. The quilts I made in the past, I hand quilted but I was going to machine quilt around the designs on the t-shirts this time and was apprehensive that even with a lot of safety pins to hold it in place, the back of the quilt would bunch while I was sewing.

In my research, I came across a quilting technique called Quilt as You Go. This technique allows you to work with smaller pieces of the quilt before sewing it all together and when you sew it together, the leading edge – the one that goes under the arm of the sewing machine – is smaller. Now, that sounded like what I wanted! With the Quilt As You Go (QAYG) technique, the back of the quilt is not one big piece. To create the quilt, each block (in this case, t-shirt) is it’s own little ‘sandwich’. Now that I had my overall plan for the building of the quilt, it was time to get a feel for how the sashing would look. Sis wanted an inch between the t-shirts so I laid a few out with some of the material to get a visual.

Getting a visual of the layout

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The next step was to cut the backing & sashing. To make sure I had enough material before doing any cutting, I laid the king-size flat sheet on the floor in the family room. As you can see, I barely had enough room. That is probably due to all the furniture we have in there, hehe. With the sheet on the floor, I then laid all the t-shirts that would fit, keeping in mind that I would also need to allow for the sashing, especially 4 strips of 2 1/2″, 108″ long. I found that the flat sheet was not big enough for all the t-shirts and the sashing, (even after I changed the direction of the layout), so I brought out the remainder of the fitted sheet too. Once I verified that I would have enough material for the backing and sashing, I started cutting.

Cutting the backing & sashing

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With all the backing, edging, sashing cut, it was time to start creating the corner and edging pieces. Using the pattern layout as a guide, I found the 4 corner t-shirts. To make each corner, I sewed 2 edging pieces together and an edging piece to the corner t-shirt. Then, I sewed the 4 squares together to make one large corner square. For the rest of the edging t-shirts, I sewed the edging piece either to the side, top, or bottom depending on its placement in the quilt. When all the edging pieces were complete & pressed, I cut a piece of batting for each and also for each of the t-shirts that would be in the center of the quilt. When cutting out the batting for a quilt, it is a good idea to allow for shrinkage that happens when you do the quilting. Keeping this in mind, I allowed and inch on all sides of each block. Once all the batting was cut, I created a fabric ‘sandwich’ with each piece by placing the backing on the bottom, wrong side up, covering it with the batting & then setting the t-shirt/t-shirt edging combo on top, securing each set with safety pins.

Cutting the batting

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The next step is to secure the batting between the front and back of the quilt. There are different methods to do this step. In the past, I have either tied them together where the seams meet in the corners using cotton twine or yarn or have hand quilted them using a stenciled pattern. For this quilt, I decided to use the sewing machine to do the securing by stitching along the seam between the edge pieces & t-shirts and then quilting around each design. Stitching along the seam line is called ‘stitching in the ditch’. The goal with this technique is to ‘hide’ your stitching by using thread with the same color as the material or using clear thread. I chose to use a soft green to match the material. I ended up using 4 spools of thread on this quilt! Stitching in the ditch was fun and really helped hold the batting in place. When all the edging squares were secured, I started quilting around each design. This was a fun process as each design was unique. Deciding just where to stitch and how much of the design to quilt made each piece an interesting creative endeavor. To help hide the stitches, I matched the upper thread with the background color of each t-shirt and continued using the green for the bobbin thread so it would blend on the back of the quilt.

Quilting

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After all the quilting was done, I decided to add a pattern to the 4 corner pieces & every other edge piece to help secure the edging. Using my quilting ruler & marking chalk, I created a diagonal pattern with the lines 2″ apart. After pinning along the pattern, I quilted each square.

Adding a quilt pattern to the plain pieces

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Boy, the quilt is really coming together now! Before connecting one block to the next, I trimmed the excess batting flush with the edge of each block. It’s time to begin connecting the blocks together with sashing! I chose to connect the blocks in vertical rows then attach row #1 to #2 then #2 to #3 and so on. To make the sashing, using my rotary cutter, quilt ruler & cutting mat, I cut two strips for each connection: one strip is 1 1/2″ and the second is 2 1/2″. To prepare the sashing, I folded the 2 1/2″ strip in half and ironed it. To attach the sashing to the block, I pinned both strips to the block, the 1 1/2″, right sides together, to the back of the block and the folded strip to the front of the block then using a 1/4″ seam allowance, sewed the set together. To attach block #1 to block #2, I pinned & sewed the other side of the 1 1/2″ strip, right sides together, to the back of block #2. With the blocks attached, I laid them t-shirt up, cut a thin strip of batting (***If your sashing is 1/2″, your seams will meet and there is no need to add this strip of batting***), placed it between the t-shirts along the sashing, then pinned the folded strip to block #2. The next step was to topstitch the folded strip close to the edge to secure it to block #2 & then topstitch close to the first seam. Continuing this process, I connected the rest of the blocks in row #1.

Attaching the sashing/connecting the blocks

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Rows complete

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Once each of the 5 rows was created, it was time to connect the rows together. Now that I was going to be working with long strips of the quilt, it was time to head to the family room where I would have more room to work. As you can see, my sewing machine sits in a corner of my sewing room so there is no room to accomodate all the material I would be working with. I set up one of my folding work tables and covered it to create a clean working surface. I brought the floor lamp from the sewing room into the space so I would have plenty of light to work with.

New workspace

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The process to connect the rows to each other is the same as connecting the blocks, just with longer pieces of sashing.

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Whew! Now that the quilt is all in one piece, it was time to trim the excess backing and sew on the binding strip. I trimmed the backing until it was 1/4″ from the edge of the quilt. To make the binding, I cut several 1 1/4″ strips and sewed them together.

Trimming the excess backing

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Creating the binding strip

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I attached the binding strip to the backing by placing it right sides & securing with pins. Using 1/4″ seam allowance, I sewed the binding & backing together. When I reached the beginning of the binding, I attached the two ends together with the same diagonal bias stitching that I used to make the binding. Once the binding was sewn to the entire edge of the quilt, I turned it over the raw edge and topstitched it to the front of the quilt. Now that the stitching was done, I washed and dried the quilt to remove the quilting chalk and to spot-check the seams.

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With the quilt finished, I surveyed the leftover fabric from the king-size sheet set – there as very little left! Sis had asked for the leftover fabric if there was any, so she could make some accent pillows. There were only two squares and some strips. I decided to surprise her and made a pillow out of the squares. I used the same diagonal quilting on it that was on the edging. It came out soooo cute!  Then, I decided to sew the strips together and make a 2nd pillow which also came out cute! The fabric has a nap to it and you can see that in the 2nd pillow. I think it gives it some interest, don’t you?

Accent pillows

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I really enjoyed the process of creating this quilt! It was great to dream about all the exotic places these t-shirts represent and how much fun Sis & Bro must have had exploring all of them!

If you decide to make a large quilt, the Quilt as You Go technique is a great one to use. It helps make the bulk of the material easier to handle, giving you better control. While it may seem to take longer piecing the blocks and rows together, it makes the quilting process so much easier!

Completed quilt

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As of the finishing of this post, my sis has received the quilt. She contacted me right away to tell me how much she loves the quilt! That just warms my heart! She sent the following picture to show me what it looks like on the bed where she will be displaying it. I am thrilled that the quilt is now home and will be a visual reminder of all the memories it holds.

Supplies Used

• 25 t-shirts
• Pellon
• Sewing notions: scissors, thread, pins, quilt ruler, cutting mat, rotary cutter, walking foot
• Sewing machine
• King-size sheet set
• King-size batting
• Stuffing for pillows

I’m excited to share more projects with you as well as tips/tricks/freebies! Just enter your email below to be one of my Blog Peeps!

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