I realized that if, for some terrible reason, I was unable to find a job for the summer, I was going to need something to keep me busy so I don't go stir-crazy being in Farmtown, USA. So, now that summer is here and I am still unemployed, I've begun working on some of them. My list includes things like stripping down the dresser my parents gave to H and me and refinishing it, sewing new curtains for our apartment in the fall, and creating a quilt out of the t-shirts from my sorority and Dance Marathon activities in college. All three of these are things that I have never really attempted before (I've sewn a few things here and there, but never made curtains or a quilt, and I've never tried stripping and refinishing furniture) and will give me a finished product for something I can use at our apartment and in the future.
This week, I started working on the quilt. It's not done yet, but it's going better than I had expected! I cut up 35 t-shirts from various events in Phi Mu and Dance Marathon that I collected throughout college. I have a t-shirt from DM's 11-15 (2006-2010), the core committee's I've been on, my Swimmy shirt, and my steering polo from DM, and various recruitment shirts including the one I wore when I went through formal recruitment in 2005, my bid day shirt, shirts from formals and socials, and even a senior bar crawl shirt from Phi Mu. I really like the idea of turning these shirts into a quilt because it's not like I'm going to be wearing them anytime soon (sadly, half of them are size small from my thinner days and I couldn't fit into them even if I wanted to) but I don't want to throw them out, either--they are tied to too many memories. Rather than throw them into a box in the back of my closet or in storage, I thought I would put them to better use in a way that I can still keep all the memories close by. It took me 3 hours, but I cut out all 35 shirts and then figured out what pattern I wanted to put them in. I've spent the past 2 days sewing strips of panels together (which was definitely interesting, since I got into roughly 4 different fights with the sewing machine, and which is why I gave up sewing today after sewing together only one strip of panels... if the sewing machine and I were Facebook friends, I would totally block them right now!) and still have more to go, but I'm pretty impressed with how well it's coming so far.
Here's a picture of it before I started sewing it together:
It's going to be big enough to cover our queen-size bed when it's done! I'm impressed with myself, that's for sure--not only am I working on getting in shape and eating healthier, but I'm also working on improving my crafting skills, too!
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