Adventures in T-Shirt Quilt Making

Happy Tuesday all! Today I am going to share my adventures in T-shirt quilt making!

It all started when one of my friends from high school contacted me about making a t-shirt quilt out of her husband's high school sport shirts. I had never made a t-shirt quilt before, but she had saw my craftiness through me sharing my blog posts to Facebook, and thought that I could give it a go. I decided to give a try, we met up and exchanged the shirts and material. How hard could it be, right?

A little background: I made two quilts a few Christmases ago for some friends and when I told the lady at the quilting store that I planned making two quilts by Christmas (this was October when I bought the material), she laughed at me. Well nyeahhh lady, I did end up finishing both before Christmas (maybe one was being finished about an hour before it was supposed to be given...) but I felt a bit burnt out on quilting and said I'd never do it again. Fast forward to today... ;) I wanted to help out a friend and do it for her much cheaper than other places that we saw, so I decided to do one more. :)

I told Mama LOC that this was my last quilt... and she said that it won't be. And she's probably right. :) We'll see. ha!


Back to our adventure!

First, each shirt had to be cut out. We used a total of 12 shirts, and tried to cut as much as possible from each shirt. You can see in the top right that I was trying to figure out how a thick panel of plaid was going to look between each shirt.

My friend picked out some neat yellow and black plaid flannel to go between each shirt. Plaid is a little harder to use as it can be hard to cut straight and sew straight - a little stray sewing can be very obvious, but if you can follow the lines of the plaid, it will be easier.

I sewed each horizontal panel of shirts first and laid them in order. A quick tip - take a picture like the first picture in this blog to help you know which shirt comes next! It's an easy reference to flip back to.

The one thing you need when working on a quilt this size? Room to work! I am thankful for my craft room and my foyer for things like this - and for Mr. LOC and his patience with the quilt on his foyer floor! <3 Here I am setting each panel into the black dividing horizontal strips. Each shirt panel will get sewn to these strips to create the top!

Black strips are in place!

This pic is a little fast forward in the process - at this point, I am sewing the quilt together - I have cut down the black flannel backing, added a layer of quilt batting, and I have hand tied the quilt together in strategic spots so that the quilt back, batting and top are tied together so they don't move. I have also basted the quilt with large stitches so that as I'm sewing my binding around the quilt, nothing moves around on me. Those large stitches come out. :) This also shows how much quilt there really is as only a little part of it is under the sewing foot at this time!

Fast forward even more...

And we're done! For some reason, that bit of flannel looks really crooked in this picture, it's not crooked like that in real life (or even if it is, it is certainly not as obvious in real life!)

It measured almost as large as a twin size bed! And the flannel she chose was perfect for this sort of thing. It is a very heavy quilt and I know it'll be great for snuggling. :)

Overall, it was a fun project and a great learning experience. Thank you to my friend for coming to me with this project, I hope you enjoy your new blanket! :) Also thank you to Mama LOC for helping me cut down the shirts, figure out the measurements multiple times, and generally being my cheerleader to keep going! ;) Also thank you to our other pair of friends who gave me a fantastic rotary cutter, board and quilting ruler for Christmas! It was a life saver.

And thank you for following along! :) Hope you enjoyed reading about my little quilting adventure.

It's Pinspired Friday! {My Very First Pin}

Good morning all! It's...

I thought today that I would showcase my very first "pin"! I was on Pinterest shortly after it started making it's rounds on the social media's and so I hopped on the bandwagon and never looked back! ;) I remember thinking... oh my word. This is crafts galore. And oh! That room is beautiful... and that outfit is stylish... pin pin pin... and suddenly found myself at over 1k pins. Yikes! As you've seen here on the blog, I do actually try to do or at least interpret the pins into something I would like to do and would actually do. I use it as a recipe book quite often now, pinning away foods I would like to make. I have a pin board for those pins I actually do - and I often write a little commentary so that if something I made was God awful, I'll remember it and maybe help someone out along the way as well. So without further ado... my first pin.

DIY Floral Pillows with Ultrasuede Petals

Is anyone surprised that it's a Martha Stewart tutorial? That wonderfully crafty (slightly crazytown) lady. I had no intention of making the pillows but I remember thinking the flower was neat. Where would I put it? I don't know. Would I buy ultrasuede to make these petals like our lovely Martha? That's a big nope. But, that's the beauty of Pinterest - you can see where you've come from, how your styles and tastes have evolved, and even release a little creative energy too.

SPEAKING of creative energy... You're probably wondering where all the tutorials are! I've been loaded with lots of different things going on this past week... and that's where my creative energy has gone. lol :)

First - Mr. LOC asked me if I would be willing to make him a bag for his tip ups, for ice fishing, and I said of course. How hard could it be?

Famous last words. ;) It actually was not TOO hard, it was a bit of trial and error as I had never made a duffel type bag, and the circles on the end were tricky. Since I wasn't following a pattern, I had to sort of...wing it when it came to measurements, and I made the bag a little long BUT, this way it actually can sling across his back vs. being carried on a shoulder, so it worked out. It was a neat experience and I had all of the materials, including that zipper (it was a super vintage one I picked up NIP at a garage sale), and he loves it so that's all that matters to me! :) And no, sorry, there will not be a tutorial since I didn't write anything down and was using scrap fabric, but I can tell you that those brown circles on the end were about 8" across.

My other BIG project of the week was a t-shirt quilt that I was commissioned to do for a friend from high school. I am THRILLLLLED (with that many L's, you know I'm pretty jazzed about it) with how well this came out as it was my first time doing a t-shirt quilt. I'll be writing a feature post next week on how this all came together. I'm very excited for my friend to receive it! :)

So tell me - what was your first pin? Why did you pin it? And do you think you would pin it again today? Thanks for stopping in!

P.S. I am not in any way affiliated with Pinterest or Martha Stewart either...! I realized about half way through that this looked like a giant plug for Pinterest. I just think it's a neat social media and a great creative outlet, that's all. :)

A Christmas Gift {DIY Foot Warmer Tutorial}

Hey everyone! Hope you had a great New Year's! I was battling a vicious cold/possible strep throat (fun!?) so not much ringing of the new year going on but still, happy 2013 to all. :)

Christmas might be over this year, but if you're like me, you start early! I actually made this in November, but couldn't share it with you all until now because the gift is for Mama LOC, and she's one of my biggest fans when it comes to this blog! haha!

Today, I am sharing my foot warmer tutorial. I was struck with the idea when I ran across something similar on the internet, but I did not care for the shape or style. Keeping with the "use what you got!" theme, I decided to create my own.

Fair warning: this post is quite picture heavy and quite long! 

I am slowly getting better at visualizing steps in my head and figuring out what is supposed to happen next when it comes to sewing. I have helped other friends get acquainted with their sewing machines and I have told them that sewing is really, truly not that hard - the hardest thing, that gets easier with practice is visualizing the next step. If you can visualize the next step, you've got it made. So to start, I wrote down everything and had my paper ready to go when I though of something else. Behold, my chicken scratch:

Hey, no one said I could actually draw...

I wasn't even going to share that but I thought it would be a good testament to the fact that you don't have to be able to draw, or even visualize every step before it happens... sometimes just getting it out on paper is super helpful. I mean, what is that in the bottom right? A drawing of teeth?

Today, we'll be ending up with this:  

Okay, so let's begin. For your entire project, you'll need:
• A piece of 1" deep, 12" long and 12" wide foam. (I used high density)
• 1/2 yard to 3/4 yard of fabric ( Cotton duck cloth is best) (you'll eventually be cutting this into two 14"x14" pieces of fabric)
• Two 8"x15" pieces of fabric (this can be the same or contrasting as the 14" x14" - mine is the same.
• One piece of 8"x15" piece of quilt backing type fabric. See below.
• 37" of bias tape
• Snaps or Velcro (Buttons as well if you're using snaps)
• Two pieces of 11" x 7" cotton fabric or muslin (I used cotton)
• A small amount of polyfill
• Rice (about 1 cup or so)
• Thread/Needle/Sewing Machine/Seam ripper

1) Start by folding your 1/2 yard to 3/4 yard fabric in half so that your fabric is two layers deep, right sides facing each other. Take your 12"x12" piece of foam and set it so that is an inch of fabric on each side. Measure out the other two sides (arrowed) so that there is an inch around the fabric around the entire foam block. Cut around. You can see my dots where I cut, also pointed out by the arrows. You'll have two pieces of 14x14 fabric when you're done with this step. This is your foot base.
Note: I am using what I had on hand - I am not sure how large this piece of fabric was before I began, hence the 1/2 to 3/4 yard measurement.

2) Set your 14x14 pieces aside. Now take another piece of your fabric (you can use the same type of fabric, or a contrasting fabric - I used the same type.) and fold so you've got two pieces of fabric sandwiched together, right side to right side. Cut an 8"x15" inch rectangle out of your two pieces of fabric. You are now cutting out your foot pieces. You should now have two pieces of foot fabric.

3) Now, take your quilt backing type fabric and cut a 8x15 piece. I was using what I had and I only had these size pieces, so I stitched them to form a 8x15 piece. You can find this fabric at Joann's in the quilting section - it was decently priced if I remember right.

4) Your fabric should now be as follows: quilting material on top, and two fabric pieces right sides facing each other.

5) Pin along the edge, and then sew together, but start about 1" from the beginning. You will only sew the left, top and right of the rectangle. This is where I made a small mistake. If you don't understand, read ahead to #6. If you start at the very beginning of your fabric, you'll just have to seam rip about 1" on each side. Read on to see what I am talking about! :) I used a 1/2" seam allowance. Trim your corners but don't turn it inside out quite yet.

6) So this is where I had made the tiny mistake, but it's not a huge deal. Since we're going to be putting bias tape along the edges, I had to open my little pocket about 1" down on each side. I had started right at the beginning of the fabric and you can't attach bias tape very well that way.

Take your bias tape, open it up and sandwich and pin the layer of fabric and quilting fabric, and then cut the bias tape. Take your bias tape again, unfold it and sandwich the fabric only layer, pin it and then cut. I had about 4" or so of bias tape left over. I used the 1" fold over bias tape, easily found at Joann's.

What you are doing, basically, is covering the raw edges so that they don't fray. It seems like we're making a big pocket at this point, which we are, kind of.

7) Now that the two sides are pinned, let's turn it inside out, careful not to stick yourself with the pins. You should have fabric on one side, and fabric and quilting fabric on the other. You might need to move around some pins so that you can easily slide them out when sewing. Now that I think about it, you could probably turn the pocket inside out and then put on the bias tape... but what fun is that, eh? Open it up so that you're not sewing the pieces to each other. You might need to slide a piece of your machine off so that you can easily sew around the outside. Think of it as kind of a sleeve, like on a shirt.

8) Woo hoo! We're half way home. Now the not-so-fun part - putting on snaps. BLARGH. It is not my most favorite thing to do and I highly suggest a thimble if you're hand sewing it like me.

9) You'll need some snaps. Any guesses as to how old these are? Vintage notions are the way to go, though - if you find them at garage sales, make sure to grab them as I am sure they'll be a lot cheaper there than at the store! I am going to be using three.

10) Attach your snaps. I put three snaps on, one in the middle and another two flanking each side, about 2-3" inches from the middle. As for putting on snaps, it's quite easy - just make sure you're attaching the right side so that the snaps will actually snap, have patience, etc. I put the receiving end of the snap on the quilt and fabric layer, and the snap with the post on the fabric only layer. You're attaching these snaps to the inside of your pocket. Eventually, your going to be able to snap the two layers together so that it holds your rice pack.

11) You may be concerned that now you can see your stitches holding your snap on the outside of the bias tape. The layer with just fabric - don't worry about. It's going to eventually be the layer that is facing the feet so you won't see them anyway. The layer with the quilting + fabric - add some buttons on top of your stitches. It's a cute adornment and does a nice job of hiding your stitches.

12) Fin! At least with that part, which is probably the most tedious part of this whole project.

13) Now set your pocket aside, and get your cotton fabric or muslin, whatever you decided to use. We're going to begin on the rice sachet. I am going to use a cotton from Moda, although I'm not sure what the pattern is called. Right sides facing each other, cut the fabric to 11"x7".

14) Using a 1/2" seam allowance, sew around the outside but leave a large enough hole so that you can inside-out the fabric.

15) Turn inside out so right sides are now facing out. Fill your sachet with a little bit of polyfill and about a cup of rice. I used just regular rice - I am not sure if it would work with instant rice. You're aiming for a decent amount of rice, and not a ton of poofy-ness - this has to fit in the pocket you made earlier.

 16) Folding your opening in, top stitch around the edge to seal the opening and to give it a nice finished look. Make sure to move the rice away from your needle as you go around - mine seemed to go through just fine on the few pieces I missed, but I am sure it's not super awesome for your needle to hit the rice.

17) A finished sachet! Test that baby out in your pocket you made earlier. Success. Take it back out and set it aside. Your sachet is about 10x6 when finished.

 18) Grab your pocket from earlier, and grab one of your 14"x14" inch pieces of fabric. You're going to set one piece of 14"x14" fabric, right side facing up, and your pocket, seamed side towards the top, and opening towards the middle.

 19) Take your other piece of 14x14 fabric and set it, right side facing in on top of the pocket and other fabric. Pin around the edges. Sew only the left, top and right sides of the fabric (I marked mine with x's so I would remember not to sew the bottom, a 1/2" seam allowance. Trim your corners.

20) Now, turn it all inside out. Your buttons should be on top. If you turned it inside out and your buttons were not facing up, don't freak out - you just have to turn it inside out, or bring it around to the other side. Hard to explain, but basically if your buttons are facing inside, push the corners in to start pushing it all back in again, but bring the pocket to the other side. If you have followed all of the directions up until this point, I promise you can get the buttons to the top, you just may have to keep turning it inside out until this happens. The first time I turned it inside out, my buttons were on top, and then I realized I had forgotten to trim the corners and I turned it back inside out, and my buttons were on the bottom. It's just a matter of turning it correctly.

 21) Push your corners out as much as possible (They're going to be slightly rounded with so much fabric going on) Now, stuff the opening with your 12x12 piece of foam.

 22) It will take a bit of situating, but the foam should fit snugly inside. Now, fold the opening over and stitch it closed. I did an invisible stitch - there are plenty of awesome invisible stitch tutorials out there so I'm not going to beat a dead horse, but you could really stitch it closed any way you want. Except on your machine, because I tried that and I am not sure I've ever seen such wonky stitches in my life! The machine foot did not like being so close to that foam.

 23) CONGRATS! Once you've stitched up your seam, you are done!! Now, try it out. If you're giving it as a gift, I highly suggest you at least microwave the sachet once, because I had some condensation from the rice on my sachet after the first time I microwaved it. Place your sachet on a microwave safe plate and microwave it for no more than a minute (I suggest trying 45 seconds). You have to be able to handle it to put it in the pocket, and I microwaved it for a minute and it was almost too hot to touch. If you're giving it as a gift, please make sure your recipient knows how long to microwave it for.

Is it possible to take a leg picture like this and not look awkward?

 24) Last step: admire your handywork. And how nice and warm it is. :)

Thank you for following along! If you have any questions, please let me know and I'll be happy to answer the best I can.

A few new things in my Etsy shop!

Hi all! Hope you had a fantastic weekend. In light of the recent promotion going on in my Etsy shop, I thought I would try to get a few new items in there! I recently acquired some vintage/antique lace of all shapes and sizes and thought it would make beautiful headbands and head pieces.

Etsy Store listing for Soft Lace Headband

 This one is a soft cottony lace, and it's probably one of my favorites because it's the first one I made... ha! It also sits on my head very well and doesn't slip around, which is a huge plus in my book. Seems like any head band I ever try to wear scoots around and there is nothing more annoying than that! This one is held with elastic so is a continuous band around the head.

Etsy listing for Gorgeous Poly Lace Headband

This one is a gorgeous polyester lace with so many details to it, slightly wider than the one above but made into a continuous circle with a bit of elastic in the back. I also think this is one of my favorite photos of myself! ha! ;)

Etsy Listing for lace applique headband

I think these are all "my favorites" but this one is stands out above the rest for me... such a fun way to use appliques and how beautiful would this be in a bride's hair? It's stark white on a grey grosgrain ribbon, with plenty extra to cascade or make a larger bow. Plus, it's guaranteed to fit any head - the elastic ones are pretty much made to fit an adult ladies head, but how cute would this ribbon one be on your baby or flower girl?

Etsy Listing for Ivory Lace Headband

This one is a soft ivory lace with a white satin ribbon laced through it. The lace goes all the way around the head, and ties in the back with the ribbon. The ribbon is so soft but thick, very high quality feeling.

These are actually pretty fun to make so I'll most likely be adding more soon. They're all $9.99 and all come in a small tulle drawstring bag so you can give them as a nice gift! :)

Don't forget! Use coupon code LITTLEOAKCHRISTMAS12 until 12/25 to receive free shipping! Enter it in during checkout to receive free shipping (it doesn't apply automatically!) Thanks for looking!