Simple Cutting Hack for Making T Shirt Quilts

One of our granddaughters was involved in soft ball, band, theater and an assortment of other extra-curricualar events during middle school and high school. So for her birthday, her dad thought it would be fun to create a quilt out of the old t-shirts that she wore as she participated in those activities. He and my daugher asked if I wanted to help. I've made a lot of quilts over the years, but I have never done a t-shirt quilt before. I knew this would be a big project--she has a lot of shirts--and trying to figure out how to cut those soft, stretchy shirts into twenty even squares was a little daunting.

So I spread the shirts out and measured side to side and top to bottom to see if I could figure out what dimension would allow me to include the important patterns on the front without running into the sleeve and neck edges. I ultimately decided that 14 inches was optimal.

But then, how to cut them? I needed to be able to see that 14" square while I cut the t-shirt fronts so that I could center the designs. For most quitlting, the easiest option is use a cutting mat, plastic cutting guide, and a rotary cutter. But I didn't have and couldn't find a template that size, and the smaller templates that I do have are somewhat opaque. I remembered that you can buy fairly thick clear plastic sheets at the hardware store, so I went to Lowes, and, sure enough, they had them in varying sizes. None of them were exactly the size I needed, but the helpful hardware people will cut them to size for you without charge. For $12, I was able to purchase the plastic and have it cut into a 14 x 14" square. (I got to keep the left over pieces. Future projects. . . .?) Not cheap, perhaps, but certainly worth it for the time it saved me.

I cut the backs off each shirt and sent them to a thrift store that recycles fabric. Then I simply placed each front on my cutting board. I didn't have to worry about measuring or straight lines or anything other than having the fabric smooth. I centered my plastic template over the emblem on the t-shirt that I wanted to highlight in the square:

Using my rotary cutter, all I had to do was cut around the template:

Voila! I hope the rest of the process goes as smoothly. . . .

Young Women's Smash Book Activity

Fact: Young Women's is new to me. I mean, yes I attended young women's class as a teenager at church, but this is my first time called to it as an adult. It's a learning curve, but I'm tentatively enjoying the process.

I feel like our last mutual activity was a success, in part do to the wonderful hoarding of goodness knows how many previous presidencies. Our YW closet, it turns out, is a treasure trove of stickers, jewels, and scrap booking do-dads. Add to it some awesome scrap booking paper and wasabi tape one of the counselors inherited from work, plus some dollar store composition books, and we were set. If you have a similar stash of materials available, this might just be the activity for you: we made "smash books," the internet-sensation, journal/scrapbook with no rules and no pressure. I hoped this would be a good prelude to upcoming personal progress activities; after all, so many experiences have a journaling component. It's also a nice start-of-the-year activity, don't you think? Resolving to document your thoughts and adventures of the upcoming year?

Here's hoping. As the girls arrived, we played a few rounds of "This or That?" as a get-to-know you opportunity. I printed the ideas from Amateur Craft Hour and cut each  suggestion into a strip of paper, thrown into a bowl. It was fun to hear which "item" each girl would pick, and hopefully a good bonding experience, too!

Next, I explained we were making "smash books" and showed some online examples to get the girls excited and give ideas of what to do. I then asked why we are commanded to keep a journal or record, and answered it a couple of ways. One, there's this great, short video from President Eyring's talk O Remember, Remember. After watching the video, we passed around and read some of my favorite quotes pulled from the New Era article The Angels May Quote from It by President Spencer W. Kimball. It's a fabulous message.

Now on to the creating! Almost. With all of these crafty supplies on hand, this is also a natural time to write an amazing birthday card, a thank you, or a "we miss you" message to anyone to whom the YW might need to send their appreciation! If the bishop or a member of your ward needs a pick-me-up, it's easy to spend 5 minutes expressing love and appreciation... in every color. And with stickers. In our case, it was the YW president's birthday, so each girl wrote a birthday note and decorated a giant card (poster, really) to leave on her doorstep.

Then, on to their books! With the 2019 youth mutual album playing in the background, we just chatted and decorated. It's nice that these books are open-ended and low pressure. We'll see if the girls bring these journals with them to Young Women's on Sunday; I feel more motivated as a leader to provide handouts when I teach so I can encourage them to glue them in. It was a fun activity.

Preschool Alphabet Letter Crafts

I'm feeling a little melancholy about wrapping up our preschool year. This makes no sense, since we plan to keep preschool going through the summer. Yet we've run out of letters, so the alphabet theme has to make way for something else.

I felt a little guilty, too, when I heard both my sisters made little books out of the alphabet letter crafts their children created. You know what I mean, right? For those preschools who work their theme of the week around a letter, part of the routine is to create a craft that incorporates the letter and a picture of something that starts with that letter. So my sweet nieces and nephews get to open up a binder and turn through 26 pages of their paper crafts.

Yet I read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Or at least skimmed it. A thorough skim. So rather than keep my sweet SourPatch's pictures, I took a picture! And threw it in the trash.

I love them, though (possibly because I picked half of them?) So here's SourPatch's Digital Preschool Alphabet Book. My disclaimer is that some (most) of these were inspired elsewhere on the internet! For those ideas I used from other sites, please look at the preschool page for that specific letter where I have linked back to the original idea. If that letter's page doesn't exist, it means I haven't done it yet OR it wasn't my letter week, in which case you'll have to ask my talented other half where she got the artwork idea. Also, occasionally it was too difficult to limit ourselves to one alphabet craft... so there are a few doubles. Now, without further ado:

SourPatch's Digital Preschool Alphabet Book.

So proud of my little man and his creations. Here's to a happy summer full of more!

Upcycling--Gift Pillows

I think I have mentioned before that I volunteer at a community resale shop. I love it because the proceeds help pay for worthy causes in our area. And I work with a group of wonderful women.

One of the side benefits, however, is that--along with huge quantities of things that I would never buy--I occasionally find a treasure. Recently one of those treasures was a small pile of beautifully appliqued pieces of fabric. It was clear that they once had been part of something else and that someone had, like me, felt that they should be rescued.They reminded me of the needlework I saw and admired on a trip to Panama a few years ago. My guess is that they originated there or somewhere close by. Although I am trying to decrease not increase my own pile of projects. I couldn't resist them. Here are a couple of examples:

So the question was, what should I do with them? Well, my sister's birthday is coming up, and she has three chickens. (Each hen is fondly named after one of our great-aunts.) What would be more fun than to make her a pillow depicting her chickens? The piece was just a little too small to fit a standard 12 x 16 retangular pillow form, so I sewed a narrow strip of black around each side of the block to make it the correct size and then cut a backing of black the same size as the completed front. (The smaller pillows I simply stuffed with polyester fiberfill.)

I like the way the black edging frames the piece. It is truly fabric art:

One of the amazing things I saw in Panama was the purple crabs on Isle Iguana. When I found the crab square, I knew it had to go to a friend who shared that adventure with me:

I love the simplicity of the cat, and it made me think of my sister-in-law who has an incredible way with animals, including her beloved cat. So this pillow is for her:

It is true that these blocks are unique and things like this don't come into the shop often. However, we do get quite a few needlework projects. Some of them have been completed and framed but are ready for a new frame or a new way to be displayed--like a simple pillow. Others I have seen come neatly folded in a bag, the stitching completed but not displayed. That was the case with this Irish Blessing counted cross stitch. Once again, I turned it into a pillow, and it became a birthday gift for another amazing sister-in-law who was born on St. Patrick's Day:

So next time you are browsing at a thrift store, flea market or garage sale, look for a hand-made work of art like these and give a gift that has been loved twice.

"You Can Do This" Doll Bed for 18" Dolls

After seeing the "closet into dollhouse" conversion I did, a friend tagged me and posted this bed on Facebook:




Of course, I fell in love and immediately went to the site. It is a project person's dream! So many cute ideas, and she shares purchasing lists for materials needed, cutting guides, diagrams, and building instructions. (I'm so excited that Elin has bought a house so that I can build her all kinds of things she probably doesn't want or need.)

I had been piling up reasons to purchase a drop saw, and this cute bed tipped the balance. You could make it using a hand saw, but having this tool made it so much faster and easier:

If you are interested in making this bed, here is the link to her instructions:

http://ana-white.com/2010/11/doll-farmhouse-bed

Because I had wood scraps available, I used what I had--including pieces of molding that were left over from framing out my bathroom mirrors. I used them as the inset panels in the head and foot boards:

Some of my scrap pieces where pretty rough, even after sanding, and mine doesn't look nearly as "finished" as hers. We'll call it a "Rustic" Farmhouse Bed:

Sweet Dreams!

Rudolph Treat Jars

I recently got to spend a magical week with three of our grandchildren. While I was there, our thoughts naturally turned toward Christmas. One of Delys' goals was to come up with an idea for a fun gift for their friends and neighbors that the children could help prepare. Glancing through a craft catalog, she saw a kit for creating reindeer treat jars. The kits weren't cheap, but we realized that we could purchase our own supplies and make them ourselves much less expensively. (These would make great teacher gifts.)

Here is what you need:

glass jars with lids (we chose pint size, but you can go bigger or smaller )
brown felt
brown pipe cleaners
large red pom poms
large googly eyes
ribbon
hot glue gun and glue

Use the top of the lid as a pattern and trace a circle:

Fold the circle in half and cut two small slits near the center:

Fold a pipe cleaner in half and thread it through the slits to create the antlers:

Bend the pipe cleaner into a fun antler shape, glue the felt circle to the lid, and replace the metal rim. Ben and Katie, ages 4 and 6, were great at threading and bending the antlers:

We were worried about using hot glue with the children, so we chose over-sized eyes and pom poms so that their small fingers would stay far away from the heat. We placed the glue dots, and they simply put the eyes and nose over them:

Of course, the best part of the process was filling the jars with candy. We chose Tootsie Roll minis, small sleeves of Whoppers, and Smarties. But Kisses or Dove or any wrapped candy would be perfect. A whole lot of sampling went on . . . .

We trimmed the rim with ribbon--you could also add a bell--and Rudolph was ready for Christmas delivery:

Texas Place Mats

Several years ago when Elin headed off to college, she found the perfect place mats to remind her of home:

When I visited her recently, we used them for dinner. They are still magical but, unfortunately, they are also beginning to show their age. So (Christmas spoiler alert, Elin) I decided to make her some new ones.

I rummaged through my fabrics and found red, white and blue pieces that I thought would work well together:

Using Elin's old place mat as a guide, I created a pattern:
Cut each blue piece 6 x 10 1/2"
Cut each white piece 5 1/2 x 9"
Cut each red piece 5 1/2 x 9"
Use a 1/4" seam allowance on all pieces.

Sew the white and red pieces together. Press the seam flat toward the red fabric (so that it doesn't show through the white on the right side):

Sew the blue rectangle in place so that when you turn your place mat to the right side, the blue is on the left, the white is on the top and the red is on the bottom. Iron the seam flat toward the blue rectangle.

I needed a pattern for a five-point star, so I googled it and was able to find one just the right size. Trace the star onto fusible webbing--like Wonder Under--and, following the directions that come with the webbing, iron it onto the blue fabric. (Fusible webbing allows you to glue one piece of fabric on top of another using an iron.)

Because the place mats will be used and washed frequently, take time to zigzag around the star as well:

Elin's old place mats had blue borders, but I couldn't find a solid blue that matched my star fabric, so I chose red instead. Cut the borders 2" wide and sew them in place. Stitch the top and bottom borders first, iron the seam flats, stitch the side borders on, and iron those seams:

Using the front as a pattern, cut a back from one of the coordinating fabrics. Place right sides together, pin front and back in place, and stitch around the outside edge leaving about a four inch opening in the middle of one side to turn it right side out. Before turning, cut the corners on the diagonal, being careful not to cut through the stitching, so that it will be easier to square the corners:

Turn the place mat right side out. Using the point of a pair of scissors, gently push the corners out. Iron the place mats flat making sure that the raw edges of the turning gap are tucked inside:

If I were a perfectionist, I would have blind-stitched the gap closed by hand. But I am not a perfectionist, and I also felt that it would be less likely to come undone if I used the sewing machine. So I simply top-stitched the gap closed as close to the edge of the place mat as I could, making sure that the stitching caught both the top and the bottom. Using a decorative stitch, I sewed over the seam that connects the border to the flag. It adds a little extra pizzazz as well as providing added stability to the piece. (You can also decorate the other seams before you sew on the borders. I wish I had thought to do that):

Here you go, Elin: