Well, I've been at it again. I love to make memory quilts with tees and people's clothes they wore and loved. I just want to put a little more love in and then it goes to someone who will love it even more because of all the memories. I typically get calls on the average of once a month asking for a memory quilt to be made and I really love doing them. Unfortunately it takes me a while to get it all together. I like to make them different, and use different techniques to make each one a unique work of art that will be cherished for many years to come. I believe striving to make a very special item for each person is the reason I get so many calls for more.
Here is a quilt I made for a girl and the tee's belonged to her father. She had many different tee's and all of these things demonstrate that her father loved his outdoor sports activities. She also brought several shirts that he wore and I have used these to make the stripping between the blocks. This is a little of the process I go through when making a memory quilt.
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First I have to get the logos trimmed out and the fuseable
put on and then lay out the shirts. |
This part is actually very time consuming. Much more so than you may think. I have to get the shirts laid out on my cutting table and I have to make sure I leave ample room around the outside of the logo for any trimming or squaring. I also try to make a habit of cutting the logos out using a whole inch measurement. Whether it's 6 or 14 doesn't matter but I don't want to do any 6 1/2 or 14 1/4. That just confuses the issue when I start doing the stripping! This is something I've learned the hard way over time. After the logos are cut out I have to go the the ironing board to add the fuseable and I do use the woven most of the time. This just seems to work better as far as I am concerned and there is less stretch. Next I retrim the logos to remove rough edges, and then I lay them out to see how it is going to look.
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At this point I haven't done anything about the stripping.
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Once I've laid the shirts out on the bed in the way I think I want them to go, taking into consideration the size and the colors then I can start thinking about the finish trimming. This is where I have to make sure that all the shirts in a row are the same width. If I can trim all the shirts in a row to a particular width, say 12" then I don't have to add any extra strips down the side. If I can't then I will add a strip of shashing down one side to keep the sizes consistent.
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If you look at the bottom of this picture you will see where I have
added an extra strip of sashing to increase the width of that tee. |
After doing the final trimming I can then add my sashing forming rows either vertically or horizonally to put the quilt top together. Next I will put the finishing trims on the top. In this case it is logos from hats that have been cut out and are satin stitched down before the quilting is done and then I do the quilting and binding being sure to add a rod pocket at the top because many of these quilts are hung.
These memory quilts are wonderful projects and I love doing them and seeing what new ideals I can come up with to make each quilt a very special one of a kind keepsake.
I hope you all have a great day and decide to one day try your hand at making a memory quilt as a keepsake to remember someone who has passed away, or to commemorate an event, like graduating from high school or college or getting married or having a baby. Whatever the occasion these quilts are a lot of fun and guaranteed to make you stretch your brain to recall all of that math you had when you were in school!
