One of my earliest quilts was a T-shirt quilt for a grandson graduating from high school to college. He wanted his red and blue shirts incorporated into a quilt with the college’s colors of gold and black. I happened upon Angela Walters T-shirt Pattern and I can’t say enough positive things about how well written and easy to follow (and to put together) the pattern is. I’ve seen it used in many instances since and it just sings in every color combination.
This was my second quilt to longarm and I was custom quilting the blocks. Looking back now, I can’t believe my audacity at trying to do so.
After finishing his quilt, we still had plenty of leftover shirts and his dad asked for another quilt for his mom in her favorite color green. My daughter came up with the idea of snowballing some squares to add interest without competing with the sports aesthetic. The free pattern we worked up is provided at the end of this post if you wish to use it. Nothing fancy, just the steps and calculations.
I used a variation of the clam shell stitch on my Handi Quilter longarm with Pro-stitcher for an edge-to-edge finish and added a flange binding with Shannon Cuddle on the back for extra coziness.
I taught a class using this design and one of my students used Harley Davidson T-shirts her husband was willing to part with.
We used Accuquilt to cut all the squares and half square triangles making it accurate and a breeze. I highly recommend French Fuse for backing the T-Shirts. I found it on Etsy. It’s very light-weight and keeps the t-shirts soft yet stabilized. Her husband cherishes it and keeps it on his recliner. Another great class!
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