T-shirt quilt questions
 

Hi everyone,

One of my friends has asked if I would be willing to make her a t-shirt quilt. I have not done this, but I know you need to stabilize the t-shirts. Any help and suggestions you can give on doing these would be great.

I just finished one but can not post to the pictures on the board but it is on my page. I used te pellon 906a light weight fusable bond behind he t-shirts, was pleased with how it turned out good luck

Yes, the Pellon 906F is what you want to use. It's extremely light weight.....

I used the tricot stabilizer on mine and it was very soft. It has some stretch, which you apply the opposite direction of how the tee-shirt stretches. Whichever kind of stabilizer you use, cut it larger than the area you want to cut out. Apply the stabilizer before cutting the tee-shirt so the edges don't curl. Once that is done, you can sew just like any other quilt fabric. I think I used a ball point needle on the piecing, and regular quilting needle for the quilting.

Question for katier825. Why use a stretch stabilizer and have to put it opposite the stretch of the t-shirt when you can use a light weight non stretch backing. I use the 904ff I think that's the # by pellon and the stretch is gone. Many of my customers bring t-shirt quilts with stretch stabilizer that I then have to deal with because they oops and put it on with the stretch of the t-shirt. I've always wondered why they did that or who told them to. I suspect they read it in a book somewhere. Not my favorite way to do it.

And also add that tricot adds a LOT of extra weight and is expensive! Go with the lightweight non stretch stuff like the Pellon 904F or you can go with the generic JoAnnes one. I haven't bought any in ages but the last time I bought a whole bolt of the stuff and it was only .99 per yard. The Pellon is definitely a better product but at the time i was doing so many T-shirt quilts and it works.

Also, unlike many, I cut my stabilizer to size first. I use scraps to stabilize as well, it doesn't have to be one piece (hate waste!). Once I have all my stabilizer ready, i cut out my T-shirt emblem then immediately fuse on the stabilizer. I get a tiny bit of curl from older T's. My method results in absolutely no waste of the stabilizer. You will have to decide for yourself if the savings is worth it. It is definitely easier to fuse a larger piece onto the T first then cut but I have done so many of these, it is 2nd nature to me.

Before i got my LA I tied them with fat bat every 4" on the T. T'shirt quilts are heavy! Much heavier than a traditional quilt top. So I can't imagine trying to manhandle that thing through a DSM. Now I have LA so I have no trouble quilting them.

Here is a picture of a tied one I did:
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And here is one I LA
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Oh wow! that is awesome. I hate wasting also.

feline fanatic: I love those pictures. My neighbor wants a t-shirt quilt and a sweater quilt. I think I will head to goodwill to get some shirt to try first. Like the fusible and cutting and sewing. What are the size dimensions to the quilts in the pictures?

Is there any other things to watch out for while making t-shirt quit? Any other tips to help?
Thanks for the great information.

I am not certain what the number is but I bought the lightest Pellon fusible that was in JAF with a 50% coupon buying the entire bolt. You want the lightest fusible because you will soon find out how heavy the t-shirts are.

Cowgirl, both of these quilts measured approximately 90 x 100 give or take. I was able to use prepackaged queen size batting for them.

The only other tips I have for a T-shirt quilt is use a pressing cloth. Don't ever touch a hot iron directly to a T-shirt emblem. The ink used on a lot of screen print designs can melt from the hot iron. (ask me how I know!)
If you don't use regular cotton fabric for sashing and sew T-Shirt to T-shirt, I recommend pressing your seams open.

Those are the only things I can think of off the top of my head.