A Blue Plaid Linen Shirt

The back of a blue, plaid, linen shirt seemed the perfect choice for the back of a small quilt.  The shirt had already been washed, dried, and cut apart, but not yet ironed.  It was large enough for my little flag quilt with inches to spare around the edges.  (Surely, the backs of gently used shirts must be a great choice for little quilts!)

Anyone who reads my blog regularly will have seen this quilt twice in the past week or two.  I apologize for that but I did want to record its making and details, finished in one week--from choosing fabrics, to sewing, to hand quilting, to binding.  Many thanks to Cheri Payne for this sweet pattern which can be found here.

Before quilting the top measured about 18" x 21".

For batting I wished for a piece of flannel but having none large enough I overlapped two small pieces of cotton batting (probably Warm and Natural) and stitched the length of them by machine.  The overlap is not obvious on the finished quilt.  Then I layered the quilt, batting, and linen back, basted the layers, and began quilting.  I think the batting was a better choice for thickness.

I don't have a great assortment of quilting thread on hand but I have some wooden spools of old "Intrinsic" thread, size 24, made by The American Thread Company.  I don't know their age but they are sound and the size is similar to, but slightly larger than, American brand quilting thread that I see at JoAnn stores.
 

I used it.  I reasoned that this is a primitive quilt and took a made-do attitude about it.

My attitude about the quilting was also primitive and make-do.  No fine quilting stitches on this.  I would call it big stitch except that the thread is finer than I've seen most use for big stitch quilting.

It's amazing what the eye misses that close-up photo shows.  All those little details... and mistakes....  Don't look too closely at that star or you'll see some really primitive applique stitches!  Still, it held in place through the washer and dryer.

When it came to binding I thought the quilt needed either red or blue.  Most of my red shirts are plaid with lights so I chose blue shirt with low contrast blues for the binding.

The finished quilt measures 16¼" x 20¼".  It now graces our front door and welcomes visitors.

Thanks for your patience with too many photos and details of this little quilt.  I was glad for a quick finish between other quilts and projects.

--Nancy.