Hawaiian Shirts and a Stash Report

Josh's box of T-shirts had two Hawaiian shirts his grandmother had made for him, and I really wanted to use them in his quilt because they're pretty special.  Originally, I wanted to figure out a way to use the actual shirt fronts, but it just wasn't going to work without taking up too much space.   I didn't have any room to spare because I was already using 25 shirts, and for 10 of those I need to use both the fronts and the backs.  

Thinking it would be easier to use the fabric from the shirts to make Hawaiian shirt quilt blocks instead, and knowing that I had seen a quilt like that somewhere, I began the search.   It turns out Moda has a free pattern that looks pretty simple and fairly straightforward. Well, it's not.  I did more ripping out than I did sewing. (Wait.  That can't be right.  I wouldn't have any finished blocks, would I?)  The first block took three hours to make! The second one took only two hours.  And, by the time I realized the trouble was entirely my fault and figured out that I needed to read the pattern more carefully, the third block really was "pretty simple and fairly straightforward".  

Isn't the 3-D collar cute?

The love bugs and peace signs are pretty groovy, too.

His favorite Gramma-made shirt wasn't there, but for some reason there was a piece of leftover fabric. I remember that shirt so well.  I have at least two photos of Josh wearing it.  I absolutely had to work it in somehow.  
  

At first, I was thinking that I would only be able to use it to make a label. When I pulled it out to have a look I realized there was more fabric than I had originally thought, enough for an entire shirt block.  I wanted to use a medium to dark grey for the background, but I didn't have any at all in my stash.  Aha!  The old "use-the-wrong-side-of-the-fabric" trick worked!

And it looks great!

I've arranged and rearranged (and rearranged some more), and have the final, final layout on my design wall.

It's time to start getting it sewn together.  Can't wait!

It's also time for my February stash report. It's not as bad as I thought it would be considering what kind of month it was!

Fabric Added in February  -   1 yard

Fabric Used in February  -   9.45 yards 

Fabric Added Year to Date  -  4 yards

Fabric Used Year to Date  -   23.56 yards

Net Fabric Used in 2018  -  19.23 yards 

                                      

Scrap Attack 2018 - February Report

February did not go anything like I thought (or hoped) it would.  Between having the flu for 8 days, recovering for several days, and playing catch-up with cleaning and laundry, I didn't get into my sewing room much at all.

My February Scrap Attack goal was to cut up my green stash into useable pieces.  This was a much bigger goal than I had set last month which was to cut up the blue stash, and I didn't have a lot of time to do it.  This is what it looked like before.

As with my blue stash a lot of the pieces actually looked like this .....

..... so they definitely needed some attention.  Not loving attention.  I didn't really have time for that.  Just your every day run of the mill attention.  It seems like cutting was all I did last month.  You can see in the first photo a lot of the fabrics in the back row were really those between-green-and-blue shades .  When there were only a few days left in the month I tried to convince myself I didn't need to bother with them because they weren't really greens.  I couldn't do it, though.  I had to do what I had to do.

These are the squares, strips, and bricks I ended up with.

This is what is left of my green stash.  (And those between-green-and-blue shades.)

At one point I had actually become so tired of cutting that I pulled out a few greens and made some pillowcases.  No. That is not cheating.  That is stash-busting.

It's time to pull a slip from my handy dandy Christmas gift bag of goals. I'm really hesitant.  The last two were not fun, and I don't know if I can handle cutting up any more scraps. Okay.  Here goes.

Whew!  I am so relieved.  I get to make something out of the Tom and Jerry scraps.  My grandsons used to love watching Tom and Jerry cartoons.   I think the DVDs we bought were just about worn out when they outgrew them. I had bought Tom and Jerry fabric to make pajamas for them, and even cut them out as you can see, but I never got around to making them.  It looks like maybe they were about 1 year old and 6 years old at the time.  Maybe 2 and 7.  So, they outgrew the PJs as well as the DVDs.   (I hate to admit this, but they are 12 and 17 now.)

I should be able to make a baby quilt or two from this.  Hopefully, this month will go a little more smoothly.   Fingers crossed!

Linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Addict Scrap Attack. 

So About Those T-Shirt Necklines

The last time I updated you on the T-Shirt quilt progress  I was wanting to incorporate some of the shirt necklines into the quilt.  I decided to try several different methods.  I didn't need to.  I just wanted to.  Actually, it was because I didn't really know what I was doing.

On the first shirt I pinned the neckline to another piece of T-shirt fabric and hand stitched it down along the curves then trimmed it.  I used a lighter color for the inset so it would show up.  I mean, if you couldn't really see it why bother, right?  I thought this looked pretty good. 

I liked it so much I did the same thing on a second shirt.  

On the next T-shirt I thought that if I used the same method I would lose too much of the neckline in the seam so I decided to appliqué it down.  Hmmm, I like the way this one turned out, too.

Now, I was having fun.  Time to get really creative.  I decided to keep even more of the neckline on this one, and use a different color for the background.  I knew I had saved some of the sleeves for a reason! 

This time I machine stitched it down.  I wanted to use grey thread on the shoulders and navy thread around the neck, but I could not find the navy.  I had every shade of blue except for navy.  So I thought, why not a really dark forest green? It would be plenty dark and might even look a little more interesting. Well, it didn't look as interesting as I thought it would, but oh, well, it was an idea.  (Of course, as soon as I was finished I remembered that the navy thread was by "my chair" in the living room where I had appliqued the other shirt.)  

I'm pretty happy that I was able to use some of the necklines, and I'm happy with how they look.  Really, they're pretty cool.  

Hmmm, I haven't thrown away any of the sleeves yet.  I wonder.....

Linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Addict - Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?

T-Shirt Time

My February goal is to have all of Josh's T-shirts sewn into a quilt top. I've been working on prepping the shirts for a while, and I've been doing lots and lots of pondering.  I'm always a little nervous approaching something I haven't done before so I usually end up overthinking it.   The first thing I did was watch this You Tube video by Rob Appell from Man Sewing. After that the huge stack of shirts in my first post about this project turned into a small stack after they were deconstructed and trimmed.

Being me, I can't just make a plain old quilt top with shirts side by side by side.  It has to be different, not totally conventional.  Well, Josh does get some credit for that since he wants some interesting shirts included - two Hawaiian shirts his grandmother made and a sweatshirt that was his grandfather's.  


















Not being able to leave well enough alone, I also want to use some necklines from the shirts .....

..... as well as this stained and torn shirt.

And for something completely different I want to use some of this mildew stained fabric, too.  I know.  Really cool, right?

So, now I have a rough layout on my design wall that I'm thinking is looking pretty good.  I left space to put the Hawaiian shirts in.  I just need to figure out how do that.  
























I actually have an idea that might just work.  If it does I'll show you next time.

Throwback Thursday (on Tuesday)

Only six weeks into the year, and I've blown two of my goals -- sewing every day and blogging more often.   I have, however, done a lot of coughing, moaning and groaning, and sleeping.  Can you say, "I think this might be the flu"?

Rather than keeping my tens of followers hanging, I decided to dig into the depths of Excel and do a little show and tell from days gone by.  Included in my Excel spreadsheet is information on each quilt I've made including whether I've posted pics of it on Flickr or blogged about it. So, I chose a few quilts I haven't yet written about and here goes.

In 2007 and 2008 my designated charity was CASA, a national association that supports and promotes court appointed advocates for abused or neglected children. People love making baby quilts for charity, but teenagers are often overlooked, so my heart goes out to them.   I love teenagers.  They can be real stinkers sometimes, but most of them are good kids.  

I made this quilt using a lot of brights. (Surprised?) A basic square-in-a-square block with black sashing and colorful cornerstones make it a fun quilt.  At 68" x 82" it's a nice size even for a pretty tall teen.  My friend, Angela (Quilted Joy) quilted this for me.  

  















This one is a smaller twin (60" x 72").  I did very simple straight-line machine quilting .....

..... and pieced the backing with leftovers from the front.

The third quilt for CASA is fun, too.  I used batiks this time and a pattern called "Spice Market" from the April 2007 issue of American Patchwork and Quilting magazine.  It's 68" x 83", another large twin.  Angela quilted this one as well.  

That's my Show and Tell for today.  Hopefully I'll have something more current to share real soon.  

Flags for Quilts of Valor

Don't you just love it when quilters help each other?  My quilty friends are giving, caring, generous people, ready to jump in and help whenever there's a need.  Gwen, a dear friend of mine, works with a St. Louis area Quilts of Valor group, and guess what?  They're having a block drive!

When I got an email from her a few weeks ago with directions for a simple Flag Block I pulled out my red, white, and blue scraps.  I set out to make 10 blocks, but I somehow cut more pieces than I needed and ended up with 11.  I can't blame the dreaded math this time.  Apparently, I don't even know how to count.



















Being just a teensy bit OCD, I couldn't possibly send a weird number of blocks like eleven!  I had to make more, and as you know, I have plenty of scraps.  Plus I love helping anyone who's helping Quilts of Valor, and when I pinned the borders onto my blocks .....

..... I found out that even my pins are patriotic!  How cool is that?  A little checking to make sure every block was just the right size .....

..... and all 15 blocks were ready to mail.  Fifteen is a nice number.

If you would like to help with this block drive check out Gwen's QOV Facebook page --  

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1953630014959346/.  As you know, when it comes to block drives every little bit helps.

Linking up with Oh Scrap! at Quilting is More Fun Than Housework

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