How to Make a T-Shirt Quilt
I've always wanted to make a t-shirt quilt before, but I've never actually taken the time to sit down and make one. I have a ton of t-shirts from my running days that have been occupying the greater parts of my dresser drawers and never see the light of day because they're too small for me now. I've actually already gone through and cut all of them up so that I could make a quilt, but I haven't taken the official leap into turning them into a quilt yet.
Every year the Athletic Department here at Georgia College has an athletic auction to raise money for their sports teams. They usually reach out to the community looking for items they can use during the silent auction portion as well as the live auction. Last year I donated some items from my personal business that I have, but my wheels started turning when I made a fabric basket to put them in. I had just gotten done making a lap quilt for my sister-in-law as a wedding gift and I thought it might be neat to make a quilt to donate for the auction. What I had in mind was to collect t-shirts from all the sports teams and make a t-shirt quilt. The person who is in charge of the auction thought it was a great idea, so when she reached back out to me this year about donating a quilt for the auction, I jumped in full-force to make it.
When making a quilt, you have to think about A LOT of things. It can almost be overwhelming at first, but just take it one step at a time and you'll be okay, I promise! I did things a little backwards this time around, mainly because I had no idea what I was doing. Don't be like me and go buy your fabric before you know how much you'll need because you may end up not getting enough, or having a ton of leftovers. I was okay having leftover fabric because I know I'll use that fabric for another project, but if you don't have a fabric stash, you might want to make sure you're getting just what you need so that you don't have a ton of excess fabric lying around.
Picking out fabric can either be really fun, or really frustrating. I spent a lot of time wandering around looking at fabric in Hobby Lobby because it was the closest store (other than Wal-Mart) that carried fabric. I knew I wanted the quilt to be bright and fun, but I had to find fabrics that wouldn't clash with the color of the t-shirts I was using. I knew most of my t-shirts would be blue, green, and gray so I wanted to pick a fabric for the front of the quilt that would really make the t-shirts stand out. I had two shirts that were a dark, navy blue and a dark green, so I decided to go with a simple bright, green chevron fabric because it would offset the darkness of those t-shirts. For the back of the quilt, I wanted to keep with the school color theme and went with a fabric that was navy blue with white polka dots on it. For this quilt (I believe) I bought about 3 yards for the front of the quilt and 4 yards for the back of the quilt. For the binding, I decided I would just make my own instead of purchasing binding that was pre-made. I did this because I like the look of binding that matches the quilt perfectly, plus I didn't want to try to find binding that matched the colors I was using.
I didn't have a pattern for the quilt I was making, which meant I had to come up with my own pattern. I happened to have some graphing paper lying around the house, so I grabbed that and a pen and went to work sketching out how I wanted the quilt to look. I knew I needed a total of 9 t-shirts in order to make at least 3 rows for a quilt, but then I realized the quilt would be pretty small. Back to the drawing board I went! I decided instead that I would make a 5 row quilt, with 3 t-shirts in each row. Instead of asking for 15 shirts, I realized I could just use the back of the t-shirts to fill in the gaps between the shirts that had logos on them. I wasn't able to get all the sports teams shirts this year, so I ended up going with one sport (which was cross country) because I had connections with the Cross Country Coach and I knew he'd get me any amount of t-shirts that I wanted. Perks of being the wife of a coach! 😜
Since this was new territory for me, I researched a lot on how to make t-shirt quilts. I watched a bunch of videos on how to make a t-shirt quilt, and I'm sure glad that I did because that saved me a lot of hair pulling moments. One thing I don't really remember reading or watching a video about was the kind of presser foot I should use when doing machine quilting. I wish I had thought about presser feet sooner because I probably would have saved myself a lot of seam ripping! Turns out, a walking foot would have been beneficial for me to have in my arsenal of presser feet. On a sewing machine there are these little teeth called feed dogs that pull the bottom of the fabric through the machine as you sew. A walking foot also has feed dogs on it, so when you sew something thick like a quilt, it pulls the fabric through the machine from the top as the feed dogs on the machine pull the fabric through the machine from the bottom. With these feed dogs working together to pull your quilting fabric through the machine, it reduces the amount of slipping fabric you have. So if you've ever tried to sew 2 pieces of fabric together that you've lined up perfectly but when you get to the end of your fabric piece and it's all wonky, perhaps you should invest in a walking foot as well!
But back to the quilt.
My quilt design required the following:
To cut all my squares I used this clear t-shirt transformation ruler from Hobby Lobby (you can purchase the same one from Joann's). I wanted all my t-shirt squares to be 12 inches when sewing them together, but I cut them out to be about 15 inches (using the outer edges of the ruler) instead just to leave room for error. When I finished cutting out all the squares, I cut out interfacing the same size and then ironed it to the wrong side of the t-shirt fabric. Once all the squares were interfaced, I cut the squares down to 12x12. To make cutting the sashing fabric easier, I folded the fabric long ways twice and cut the fabric into 2 inch strips. Once all the strips were cut, I then cut the strips 12 inches in length as well as 16 inches in length.
The next part is VERY IMPORTANT when making a quilt: lay out your squares! It's time consuming, but well worth the time, I promise. You want to make sure that the design of your quilt will be appealing to the eye. I had a few different colored shirts, and I didn't want to put any of those colors next to each other. Honestly, I can't take credit for this part of the quilting process. My husband is a little OCD and has a much better eye for balancing colors than I do. I laid out what I thought looked good and he came over and changed it...hahaha. Once I had the placement of all my t-shirts, I took a picture of it with my phone so that I could refer back to it if I needed to. I also took my graph paper that had the mock up of my quilt on it and wrote down in each square what color went where. I then stacked up the quilt row by row, pinning a number to each row with a piece of paper to help keep things straight when I piece the quilt together. I did end up accidentally getting 2 squares out of order which caused me to have to do some seam ripping...but that's okay. It was easily fixed!
I sewed row by row to make things go faster. I find that when you go ahead and do all the repetitive stuff at one time (for example, cutting all the shirts, then cutting all the interfacing, then ironing the interfacing) it makes the process run much smoother and goes a lot quicker. You want to be as efficient as possible, especially when quilting, because it's time consuming.
I pinned and sewed the sashing around the edges of the squares first and then pinned and sewed each square together in the row.
Once each row was finished, I then pinned rows 1 and 2 together and used my sewing machine to stitch them together. I pressed with my iron before pinning the next row to the previously sewn row. Once they were all sewn together it was time to add the batting and the backing!
I cut the cotton batting to be 2 inches wider than my quilt top to account for any slipping while sewing. I laid the backing wrong side up on my floor because that was the largest flat surface I had. Next, I laid down the batting, and then I laid the quilt top over the batting. I did use some quilt basting spray that I got from Hobby Lobby (you can get it here from Joann's--it's on sale right now!) between each of the layers to keep them from slipping around as much when I picked up the quilt. After I basted the quilt with the spray, I also ironed the entire quilt to make it adhere together a little better. I then used big safety pins to pin all of the quilt layers together to ensure there would be no slipping while I sewed!
Here's where I messed up slightly. You want to start from the MIDDLE of your quilt when you use a sewing machine. Sometimes the fabric will want to bunch up, and if you work from the middle out then you won't have to worry about bunching as much. I didn't do this and I had to rip some more seams out..hahaha. I kept this quilt pretty simple and just stitched in the ditch, meaning that I sewed in the seams between each row. When I finished stitching in the ditch around the quilt, I trimmed off the excess batting and then added my binding.
I was pretty happy with how this quilt turned out, and I'm excited to make another one someday (hopefully soon)!
Every year the Athletic Department here at Georgia College has an athletic auction to raise money for their sports teams. They usually reach out to the community looking for items they can use during the silent auction portion as well as the live auction. Last year I donated some items from my personal business that I have, but my wheels started turning when I made a fabric basket to put them in. I had just gotten done making a lap quilt for my sister-in-law as a wedding gift and I thought it might be neat to make a quilt to donate for the auction. What I had in mind was to collect t-shirts from all the sports teams and make a t-shirt quilt. The person who is in charge of the auction thought it was a great idea, so when she reached back out to me this year about donating a quilt for the auction, I jumped in full-force to make it.
When making a quilt, you have to think about A LOT of things. It can almost be overwhelming at first, but just take it one step at a time and you'll be okay, I promise! I did things a little backwards this time around, mainly because I had no idea what I was doing. Don't be like me and go buy your fabric before you know how much you'll need because you may end up not getting enough, or having a ton of leftovers. I was okay having leftover fabric because I know I'll use that fabric for another project, but if you don't have a fabric stash, you might want to make sure you're getting just what you need so that you don't have a ton of excess fabric lying around.
Picking out fabric can either be really fun, or really frustrating. I spent a lot of time wandering around looking at fabric in Hobby Lobby because it was the closest store (other than Wal-Mart) that carried fabric. I knew I wanted the quilt to be bright and fun, but I had to find fabrics that wouldn't clash with the color of the t-shirts I was using. I knew most of my t-shirts would be blue, green, and gray so I wanted to pick a fabric for the front of the quilt that would really make the t-shirts stand out. I had two shirts that were a dark, navy blue and a dark green, so I decided to go with a simple bright, green chevron fabric because it would offset the darkness of those t-shirts. For the back of the quilt, I wanted to keep with the school color theme and went with a fabric that was navy blue with white polka dots on it. For this quilt (I believe) I bought about 3 yards for the front of the quilt and 4 yards for the back of the quilt. For the binding, I decided I would just make my own instead of purchasing binding that was pre-made. I did this because I like the look of binding that matches the quilt perfectly, plus I didn't want to try to find binding that matched the colors I was using.
I didn't have a pattern for the quilt I was making, which meant I had to come up with my own pattern. I happened to have some graphing paper lying around the house, so I grabbed that and a pen and went to work sketching out how I wanted the quilt to look. I knew I needed a total of 9 t-shirts in order to make at least 3 rows for a quilt, but then I realized the quilt would be pretty small. Back to the drawing board I went! I decided instead that I would make a 5 row quilt, with 3 t-shirts in each row. Instead of asking for 15 shirts, I realized I could just use the back of the t-shirts to fill in the gaps between the shirts that had logos on them. I wasn't able to get all the sports teams shirts this year, so I ended up going with one sport (which was cross country) because I had connections with the Cross Country Coach and I knew he'd get me any amount of t-shirts that I wanted. Perks of being the wife of a coach! 😜
 |
| Figuring out square dimensions |
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| Picture of feed dogs on a sewing machine |
But back to the quilt.
My quilt design required the following:
- 15, 12" x 12" t-shirt squares
- 30, 2" x 12" strips (for the sashing)
- 30, 2" x 16" strips (for the sashing)
- Enough backing fabric to be the same size as the quilt top
- Cotton batting that is about 2 inches wider than each side of the quilt top
- Fabric to create the binding for the quilt
- Interfacing for the jersey t-shirt squares.
Again, I purchased 3 yards of fabric for the sashing and 4 yards of fabric for the backing, both of which was way more than I needed, but I didn't want to have to make a trip back to the store because of the time crunch I had. I found this really great interfacing at Hobby Lobby that was specifically made for making t-shirt quilts. This t-shirt project fusible interfacing comes in a reusable plastic pouch so you can put any leftover interfacing back in the bag when you're finished (I hardly had any left). You can get a similar kind at Joann's as well. The interfacing goes on the back of each of the t-shirt squares (wrong side) to keep the fabric from stretching while sewing. It also gives the jersey fabric a really great body and texture to it, making it look much more professional when the quilt is all finished.
To cut all my squares I used this clear t-shirt transformation ruler from Hobby Lobby (you can purchase the same one from Joann's). I wanted all my t-shirt squares to be 12 inches when sewing them together, but I cut them out to be about 15 inches (using the outer edges of the ruler) instead just to leave room for error. When I finished cutting out all the squares, I cut out interfacing the same size and then ironed it to the wrong side of the t-shirt fabric. Once all the squares were interfaced, I cut the squares down to 12x12. To make cutting the sashing fabric easier, I folded the fabric long ways twice and cut the fabric into 2 inch strips. Once all the strips were cut, I then cut the strips 12 inches in length as well as 16 inches in length.
The next part is VERY IMPORTANT when making a quilt: lay out your squares! It's time consuming, but well worth the time, I promise. You want to make sure that the design of your quilt will be appealing to the eye. I had a few different colored shirts, and I didn't want to put any of those colors next to each other. Honestly, I can't take credit for this part of the quilting process. My husband is a little OCD and has a much better eye for balancing colors than I do. I laid out what I thought looked good and he came over and changed it...hahaha. Once I had the placement of all my t-shirts, I took a picture of it with my phone so that I could refer back to it if I needed to. I also took my graph paper that had the mock up of my quilt on it and wrote down in each square what color went where. I then stacked up the quilt row by row, pinning a number to each row with a piece of paper to help keep things straight when I piece the quilt together. I did end up accidentally getting 2 squares out of order which caused me to have to do some seam ripping...but that's okay. It was easily fixed!
 |
| Here's where I switched the outer squares in the last row and didn't notice. |
I pinned and sewed the sashing around the edges of the squares first and then pinned and sewed each square together in the row.
Here's where I messed up slightly. You want to start from the MIDDLE of your quilt when you use a sewing machine. Sometimes the fabric will want to bunch up, and if you work from the middle out then you won't have to worry about bunching as much. I didn't do this and I had to rip some more seams out..hahaha. I kept this quilt pretty simple and just stitched in the ditch, meaning that I sewed in the seams between each row. When I finished stitching in the ditch around the quilt, I trimmed off the excess batting and then added my binding.
I was pretty happy with how this quilt turned out, and I'm excited to make another one someday (hopefully soon)!
Happy crafting!
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