Tennis T-shirt Quilt

 I am so excited that I finally get to share this quilt! Excited because that means it's finished! Yippee! It only took a couple of years. Seriously. Two years ago my younger brother brought me a box of his tennis t-shirts and asked if I could make them into a quilt. Sure! But being a bit overwhelmed by the amount of t-shirts and the fact that I'd never made one before it quickly went to the back burner.

It was eating at me that I wasn't getting it done and I've been slowly working on it for the past year. I finally decided I need to finish it so I could cross it off the list! Actually it was fun to reminisce as I worked on it. Andy was a big juniors tennis player and I spent many a weekend taking him to his tournaments and to his weekly practices. He and I have always been pretty close and it was so fun to watch him play. He continued with tennis and is now a tennis pro and does amazing tennis analysis work. He was also able to use his acting chops recently to do a Wilson commercial with Roger Federer!

I used a 15" square ruler and squared off each shirt and then used iron-on interfacing on the back of each one. I framed each shirt with black sashing and used green sashing squares in each corner.

 I wanted the back of the quilt to be cozy and comfy so I chose a green and black polar fleece, I think a John Deere plaid? But it coordinated well. I also put Warm & Natural batting inside so this is a heavy, warm quilt! Which is why when I went to quilt this quilt I nicknamed it "The Beast"!

 Quilting was probably the hardest part of this quilt. I really wish I had sent it out to a long arm quilter. This is a queen size quilt and SO heavy! It was hard just to get it to fit in my machine. But I did it! After much debate I finally decided to make tennis balls in each square. I didn't want too much quilting and thought it worked perfectly. In every other square I moved the curved lines from horizontal to vertical.

I also quilted straight lines down each side of the black sashing which made a nice little design in the green blocks as well. When I was done I washed and dried it to get it nice and clean and smelling good to give to Andy. He loved it! I'm so glad I was able to finally finish it for him. And to be able to cross it off the list! Have you ever made a t-shirt quilt before? I've had a few requests, but I don't think I'll be making another one for quite a while! :)