T-Shirt quilt, Part 2

I'm getting there on the quilt! I went to the fabric store a couple of weeks ago and replaced the nice sewing scissors I misplaced in my last move. I also went to get fleece that was on sale for the back of the quilt and found some great red and yellow fleeces that should go well with the designs on the shirts.

The woman was helping me decide on how much fabric to get and started asking me about what I was doing. She asked how I was stabilizing the t-shirts, so I mentioned the interfacing I ironed on. I had brought the pieces with me and pulled them out. It was nice to impress the Joann's lady!

Without further ado...She whipped out some numbers about how big a lap quilt is, and it was much smaller than my measurements. So I increased all of the in between strips to 4" final measurement. I also decided to use more t-shirt material for the in between strips since I had it. I spent a lot of time cutting more t-shirt material...then cutting more interfacing...then ironing on the interfacing...

I have been good about pinning things before sewing so they stay in the right place and ironing my seams open so hopefully everything will lay flat in the end. One thing I did not do was stitch the edges of the interfacing and t-shirt material. You can see here that it is coming apart after I sew it and iron it together. Hope it does not end up matting in the end!

I had been working on the quilt on Saturdays, then had to come home early one day last week to meet the plumber here and got a good chunk of the work done that you see above. The top is almost all put together now, so if I make the time this weekend, I might get it close to finished!

T-Shirt quilt, Part 1

I do not know how many parts this project will take, but you will be lucky enough to read about all of them. :-) I have done the New England MS Challenge Walk 8 of the 10 years they have organized it. I get a t-shirt for training and a t-shirt on the last day. I do not wear this many t-shirts often enough to keep letting them take up drawer space, and thought a while back that I could make them into a quilt. After talking about it for a while and getting some quilting supplies for Christmas, I finally started the quilt. I figured I should document the step-by-step because I told my Mom I would make one for her if mine ends up looking good! Plus I can fix the mistakes I have made if I do another.

[Just skip to the last picture if you want to see how far I have gotten but do not care so much about the process.]

An initial search on the internet and Pin-terest provided good guidelines of co-opting stretchy t-shirts for quilts. I planned my own layout because the t-shirts have different sized designs, but am an organized person so went with nice columns. The approximate final measurements of my quilt should be about 24" x 51". I think that might be a small lap quilt? I can still play with the measurements by changing the pieces in between the blocks.

ANYHOO, here is the step-by-step to date.

Last weekend I took my sewing machine out of its box and put all my supplies on the table next to it. I have a new cutting mat, ruler, and rotary cutter. I have been unable to find my good metal sewing scissors, but luckily still have the mediocre orange-handled pair. This is not important to know at all, but I am including the details anyway. I mean, this was step one - unpacking my sewing machine!

Second step was to decide how I wanted the t-shirts organized. I measured all the designs and put little pieces of paper on them so I could figure out how they would fit in two columns. I ended up with chronological order, as if you were reading a book, row by row.

I planned on equal column widths and different heights for each t-shirt.

On to the cutting. When it comes to sewing, cutting is the part I like the LEAST. If you make a mistake, it is possible that it is not fixable. With the t-shirts, you have to remove the sleeves and backs. This is the first t-shirt I did, and figured out the most efficient way to get them cut after this.

The t-shirts did not have any side seams, and the left sleeves have 'ALUMNI' printed on them. So I first removed the left sleeve to use later, then just cut the front off the rest of the shirt, leaving the neck, back, and right sleeve attached - less cutting! I made little white lines on the shirt to help with the cutting.

VERY IMPORTANT: I planned for a 0.5" seam allowance on all sides by adding an inch to each measurement on the little piece of paper you can see in the picture below before cutting so I had the correct numbers in my head. Ironically, this first t-shirt I did that I was super careful about was the only one I cut incorrectly.

After this first shirt, I did the the top cut first, then used the cutting ruler and the lines on the mat to make the process more efficient. That little pile o' fabric under the table grew with each t-shirt. :-)

Because t-shirt material stretches, you need to use fusible backing so that the fabric sews evenly and the final product is sturdier. After cutting all the t-shirts into blocks, I had all the final measurements and cut pieces of fusible backing/interfacing the same sizes.  I did not really want to plan out the entire quilt before buying any fusible backing, and luckily Jo-Anns has these small 10 yard bolts of lightweight fusible interfacing!

This was super easy to cut with the rotary cutter. Next step was ironing all these pieces together. The bolts of interfacing do not come with directions, my 4-H years ended 14 years ago, so thank goodness for the internets. I put the t-shirt pieces face down on the ironing board, the bumpy side of the interfacing down on top of that, then a thing cloth napkin, sprayed that with water, and ironed with a HOT iron pressing down and moving the iron from spot to spot without rubbing. When it comes to applying interfacing, rubbing is bad.

Okay, so the columns were supposed to be 14 inches wide, so the pieces were cut 15 inches wide for the two side-seam allowances. Apparently that first t-shirt with the big 3 on it was cut to be 2 inches short. Then I mis-cut an "ALUMNI" sleeve that I was going to use to fix it, so I had to cut a different sleeve to make up for it (see photo below). :-(

I was going to put the "ALUMNI"s between the designs, but have two fewer now after a couple of mistakes. I think I may just use random pieces of blue t-shirt to fill in all those strips.

At the MS Walk, there are red (or orange) colored shirts for people who have MS and are comfortable disclosing that. The other walkers get blue shirts. I plan to use a red/orange/pink fleece to do the backing and not fill the quilt. Figuring I make one for my Mom, I will probably do the reverse - red and orange top with a blue backing.

This pretty much covers the necessary steps, I think, to prep t-shirt material. I will probably post again when I decide how to fill in the spaces and put the top together.

Healthify

This buffalo chicken dip I made is DELICIOUS and also by no means healthy. I also have quite a bit left over from the football game that shall not be discussed. I thought about making a buffalo chicken grilled cheese, but one could easily argue that's even less healthy. I thought I would just put lettuce on it to make it healthy.

BUT, then I realized I could just cook up some cauliflower in the microwave in a quick 7 minutes on high (mix half way through), chop it up smaller with a spoon, top with some buffalo chicken dip, and heat. With a side of half a cucumber, I figure that is a lot healthier than some of my other options.

Plus I ran today. It was 45 degrees when I got home, so I had to get outside. I usually go by time and not distance. I ran 19 minutes and fast walked 24 minutes. If it was 45 degrees year round, I thought I might, one day, down the road, after lots of hateful words, sorta become a runner. In the meantime, I will just resent the fact that it is probably the cheapest fastest way to try to get back in shape a bit. Add to that this easy ab/arm addition, and maybe I can get rid of this little belly...and make my back stop hurting...and make my hip stop hurting...

...Maybe I'm just getting old.

Kids these days

I have had a few interactions with the less-than-21-crowd recently that leave me a bit...concerned? dismayed? Whatever the right word is, I have been unimpressed.

The biggest 'issue' I have is related to two alumni interviews I did for my alma mater. This is actually the first year I have volunteered to interview, but I know several people who have done it for years. The two applicants were very different, and I had different impressions of who they are and their level of interest in the college after talking with them. For one of the interviews, I had to contact the applicant twice to try to set up a time, AND the applicant was off reading in the library and only found me at the front 15 minutes after we were supposed to meet...as in I guess she thought I would wander around the library asking young women if they were her? Aside from that, the most surprising thing is that neither applicant sent me a thank-you after the interview. They both had my email address and phone number. It would have taken less than five minutes to thank me for my time and the opportunity to add to their application package and blah, blah, blah. On top of that, I thought parents were supposed to be all over-involved in their children's lives (stereotypically speaking about those helicopter parents, of course). Did none of those parents (and one applicant was driven by a parent lest you think they met me without a parent's knowledge!) check in with their child after the interview to tell them to send a quick thank you?

The second 'issue' has to do with a sense of, I think, entitlement I often encounter in undergraduates. This is not meant to apply across all undergraduates, but my example illustrates what I mean. The grad student in my lab just got married, and we did not have an end-of-semester lab get-together in December as my boss likes to do. So she teamed up with the head of the grad student's wife's lab for a joint "happy wedding!" get-together. We have some new work study students in the lab, and the one who is a freshman was able to come. After we had all eaten and we were sitting around in various places chatting, said freshman came in holding a beer. He had his hand completely over the label at all times, as if that would prevent us from figuring out what he was drinking. Is drinking really SOOOO exciting that as a non-21-year-old-freshman you would grab a beer at a professor's house???? I think this exhibits a clear lack of respect for our hosts. For those of you into judging others, this kid also wears a baseball hat with a flat rim, which I personally find looks silly.

In the kitchen

I am on a roll in the kitchen. I already mentioned that waffles are my new favorite quick breakfast. I continue to make small tweaks whenever I make them. Right now I am using up some dried plums, a.k.a. prunes, and I sent CF a batch recently.

The past couple of weeks I used my crock pot a lot - chicken and dumplings, taco chicken, beef stew - and I have more to make with the crock pot too. Danielle pointed out that when cooking for one person, freezing some from your crock pot meals makes a lot of sense. I have found that chicken turns my stomach after one round of left overs, but crock pot-cooked chicken does not. So freezing crock pot chicken will be great! The taco chicken I made was just a couple of chicken breasts, some left over black beans, the last of a jar of salsa, some chopped green pepper, and some spices. Cook on low for 6 hours. Shred chicken. Ta da!

This weekend was a chance to try recipes found on my latest obsession, Pin-ter-est. One is a flax meal crust for pizza that my sister found. This is RIDICULOUSLY easy. I did not have any tomatoes or tomato sauce or anything. I mixed some plain yogurt with some onion soup mix to spread just a little on the crust for some sauce stuff. (The remainder will be used as onion dip for veggies later.) On top was the last of some bacon chopped and fried before putting on the pizza, chopped spinach and artichoke hearts from the freezer, some cooked mushrooms.

Obviously cheese on top. Here in the Midwest, cheddar is yellow. It still bugs me.

This made a small pizza, but the third of it I had for dinner was very filling. I liked this crust better than the cauliflower crust I made recently. If I want to make the flax meal crust more regularly, I need to find an inexpensive source of flax meal though. This recipe was worked out as a carb-free alternative to pizza crust. I managed to keep the pizza pretty carb-free (except for the onion soup mix), but would ultimately love a healthier crust that still tastes like bread. I may play with this one by adding some beer to give the crust a yeasty taste. I am sure you will be on the edge of your seats waiting for that post.

I also made some quinoa cakes, which are not nearly as visually appealing as the ones pictured on the link, but are still delicious. My sister had already made these and said they were good. I actually made them for breakfast tomorrow, to be topped with red pepper spread from Trader Joe's, goat cheese, and an egg.

Skimming through my Food! board on Pin-ter-est, I see I tagged zucchini pancakes. I highly recommend those too. I made them over the summer, and also shredded and froze a bunch of zucchini I may have to thaw to make the pancakes again.

A journey

I open the curtains for the cat so if it is sunny, she can lay in the sun, but also so she can look out the windows. I went looking for her last weekend before I left, and she was laying at the foot of the bed in a patch of sun. She did not greet me when I got home a few hours later so I went to look for her again. She was now at the head of the bed in a patch of sun with a clear path of indented comforter from her earlier spot. This is what I suspect happened: