Sigma Alpha T-shirt Quilt

[sus]

New on the national website is a picture of the T-shirt quilt that will be raffled off during National Convention. To take a look, go to the convention page, scroll down almost to the bottom until you see a thumbnail of the quilt, and you'll find a link to a full sized picture. The quilt is being backed with a dark green and khaki gingham print (not shown in the photo). If you won't be attending convention but still want a chance to win, just let me know.

Thanks for posting the picture, Beth!

Susan Perkins
NAB Treasurer

[sus]

There is a new picture of the quilt on the website now! It shows every square of the completely finished product. The stripping (the khaki colored strips between squares) is quilted with an intricate vining leaf pattern. Each square is quilted with free-formed curves & little heart or leaf accents around the t-shirt design. It's turned out better than I ever expected! My husband may choke when he sees how I spend on raffle tickets!!

Good luck to everyone who's purchased tickets so far. If you're attending convention, bring that check book so you can have a chance of winning too!

[NCSUTractorChic]

The quilt looks awesome! After convention, would it be possible for someone to post directions on how to make your own SA quilt? I have a ton of SA T-shirts that are starting to wear out and I'd love to do a memory quilt of my own.

Thanks!
Beth

[BFulton]

Inquiring minds want to know who is the lucky new quilt owning sister?!

[sus]

The winner was newly elected National Board member, Jennifer Jennings, from the SFA Alumni in Nacogdoches, TX. Thanks to everyone who bought tickets! It was an outstanding fundraiser bringing in well over $800! As soon as I get the final money totals, I'll let you know!

As for the request for the instructions on making the quilt -- here you go:

Each t-shirt should be backed with an iron-on stabelizer. Get the lightest weight stabelizer you can find that prevents stretch in BOTH directions. Ask at the fabric store for advice in selecting it if you're unsure. When cutting up the shirts and ironing on the backing, be sure to waaaaaaay over-estimate the size you want the square to be. Once you've backed all the pieces of the shirts you want to use, lay out the pieces and arrange them in a preliminary order. I would recommend working in rows going across the quilt. The trick to laying the squares out is to select designs that are about the same height to go on the same row. Each row can be a different height, but each row MUST end up being the same length. It takes a lot of measuring to get that just right. Once I had a preliminary layout, I cut a good quality bed sheet into strips to be sewn between squares (those strips are called the stripping). The lady who quilted the quilt, tho, suggested I not use a sheet again because that fabric tends to show the holes if you have to rip any stitches out. If you don't want to work with a sheet, go to a fabric store and choose a nice cotton in the quilting section. The stripping of this quilt was 2". I worked on sewing rows together that were all the same width and then sewed each row to the one above it. If you look closely at the picture online, you can see the rows. There is an uninterrupted piece of stripping between rows. After I sewed all the rows together, I edged the entire quilt with one more row of stripping, then took it to the quilter for her to do the rest.

You'll need these supplies to cut the squares to make life a lot easier: a rolling cutter, a ruled cutting mat, & a wide see-through ruler. Be sure to iron all your seams OPEN so each seam lays flat.

That's pretty much it. The rest is up to you and how creative you can be using the different sizes & colors of t-shirt designs. Thanks again to everyone who bought tickets!!