26 August 2013

t-shirt quilt

All of my upcycling projects culminated in this pièce de résistance...the t-shirt quilt.  It took me months to make, mainly because I had no clue what I was doing, but I'm quite proud of the finished product.


When I say I didn't know what I was doing, I mean I had never quilted before or even really watched anyone make a quilt.  I kept thinking that at some point my inexperience would cause me to make a fatal error, but surprisingly everything worked out well.  The main flaws that exist are due to the fact that I was working with jersey which can be a bit annoying.  ecokaren blogged about her t-shirt quilt, and her tip to apply interfacing to the t-shirt material was a lifesaver.  Besides that I learned the quilting basics from a library book, and used pretty prudent's quilt binding cheat to finish the edges.

Binding cheat = fold over the backing
In summary, I would encourage anyone to try this project.  It's a great way to keep your special t-shirts! I was able to do all this with my sewing machine without purchasing a quilting foot.  The interfacing made all the difference in the world, and having a bit of experience with sending jersey through the sewing machine before did help--it's good to understand your fabric.

14 August 2013

pochette from a shirt

So this quick project was another pinterest find, linking to a youtube tutorial on how to make a t-shirt pochette (not an envelope-style purse, but a "little pocket").  My advice is to watch the video on mute...the music isn't too great.  While this bag is simple enough that a few pictures could have relayed the instructions, it's sometimes nice just to watch someone crafting on youtube.  

Simple flowers for embellishment
I wanted to make more of a proper handbag handle and just had to experiment a bit with making one.  They do sell handles at craft stores for those people who make their own purses, but they would have looked too serious at the top of this casual bag.  After a couple trials I ended up with a a simple decorative stitch to bind some fake leather from the trims section and I'm pretty happy with the look.