No Need for Plain White T's

Kicking off the new year with a major DIY project!  I made my t-shirt quilt two summers ago (before I had this blog!) so there are no photos of that time, but I'll try to document the best I can.


I have tons and tons of t-shirts, and I hate throwing them away.  In my first quilting foray ever, I ambitiously decided to make this.  The hardest part was cutting up my t-shirts... some of which I've had since elementary school!  I took 20 shirts that I'd had from high school and even further back - from homecoming, powderpuff, and lots of track shirts.  It was a pretty lengthy project, but definitely doable.


My t-shirt quilt is a bit unique since I also wanted to incorporate the backs of shirts.  I had some really great ones like our senior class shirt which had a great "You know you're in the class of '07 when..." which almost doubled the time my quilt took.  A lot of t-shirt quilts I've seen just has a plain solid back.  Also, I border-ed my shirts, which also took a while, and instead of using a straight border (butted border in quilterspeak), I used a diagonal border (mitered border in quilterspeak), which I had to figure out how to do.


Before you start your quilt, you should decide:

1. how many shirts you want to use
2. the type of borders and how thick they will be
3. whether you want to use the back of shirts also

This is a pretty lengthy project, but as long as you are patient and can sew in a straight line, you can do it.

Christmas Wrapping

Last minute have-to-do's!

Regardless of the fact that I haven't started wrapping any of my presents (save this one), I thought I'd share one of my favorite eco-tricks for wrapping gifts.

While sometimes I'll snag some wrapping paper from my parents, or even buy some recyclable gift wrap (Earth Presents, a company I work with occasionally, creates recyclable gift wrap from 100% post-consumer content - because most gift wrap can NOT be recycled due to the shine and sparkle in it), I'll wrap my smaller gifts in old magazine sheets.

I hate the look of gifts wrapped in newspaper, but magazines have such pretty pictures and end up looking really great covering a gift.  This gift doesn't yet have ribbon or a tag, but the addition of that will make this gift presentable (hahahaha, sorry).

To wrap your gift in 100% post consumer content:
Items needed:
- magazine
- tape, double-sided if you want to get all Martha Stewart-esque
- scissors
- gift
Time: 3 minutes
Cost: $0 - I save magazines from years ago... I still have my YM magazines.  Yes, they stopped publishing that in 2004... I know.
Instructions:
1) find a page or spread that you think would look good as wrapping
2) rip out the pages (or cut them out if you are more patient than I am)
3) tape the pages together if there are two pages (because I ripped my pages out, I fold them over to make the seam prettier)
4) wrap like you would a regular gift

And now you have perfectly functional gift wrap.  It does work best for smaller items, so I'll have to get a little more creative for the larger gifts.

Plastic Christmas Wreaths

To get into the winter spirit, I made this cute wreath for our house.  True, on the inside our house might be a mess of half-written term papers and Solo cups, but on the outside, we're slowly getting into the spirit.

The best part is I made it using household items that would have just gone to the bin - plastic bags and a wire hanger.  I used ones that my newspaper came in, but I could imagine a cute wreath made out of multicolored bags.  I finished this while watching two episodes of Law & Order and an episode of the Office.

To make your own plastic bag wreath:
Items needed:
- wire hanger
- plastic bags
- scissors
Time: 2.5 hours
Cost: $0 - all bags were saved and the wire hanger was from my roommate (thanks, Laurel!)
Instructions:
1) bend wire hanger to an approximate circle
2) cut up plastic bags into strips: I folded mine up and then cut straight across, but you may need to play around to see how thick you want your wreath to be
3) tie the strips around the hanger until the hanger is covered
4) hang on your door

A free and adorable craft - especially for those who can't bear to throw out any plastic bags.  Ours is currently hanging on the inside of our front door because of the crazy wind but hopefully when it gets calmer I'll hang it outside.