And I thought I was done cutting…

I’m back from Fabricland and sadly, it was more disappointing than anticipated.  First of all, I walked into the huge store expecting to find a plethora of flannel fabric, to which I found only a couple of racks.  I was disappointed in the variety, and I really didn’t find anything I really liked.  Luckily, I had gone to Quilter’s Haven in Moose Jaw first, just to check out the patterns there, and to my surprise, there were more that I liked there!  But since I am 1) a woman and insist on window shopping everywhere before purchasing, and 2) because I was already planning a trip to Regina, I decided I would test my luck at Fabricland before settling on the beautiful pink and grey plaid I found at Quilter’s Haven.  I also needed to find another colour of flannel to go in between my t-shirt and the backing, to which I settled on black.  (I’d also like to point out that the prices in Moose Jaw were cheaper!)

Via Tenor

So now that I have my t-shirt squares cut and interfaced, and the flannel bought, it was time begin the real fun!  The kind lady who helped me in the store, helped me measure out how much I would need and gave me instructions to wash the flannel pieces first separately as I had two different colours.  Then I had to dry them and check the dryer every 15 minutes or so because there would be so much lint in the lint catcher as well as the dryer.  She was not wrong.  So washed and dried, I was ready to start sewing — except I decided in my last blog post, I would be sewing one t-shirt to my two pieces of flannel first, then sew all of my squares together to make my quilt.  I followed this blog for some guidance on sewing it all together.  I like the idea of making an X on the squares, but I’m not sure if I want that pattern across my t-shirts.  However, it was nice to see a visual of how to sew the rows and squares together.  This method also means I had to measure and cut all my flannel squares now, before starting to sew.  This is where, once again, I realized this is a bigger project than I anticipated.  So a night of cutting 30 black squares and 30 plaid squares began.  I started with strips and then cut those strips into squares making two at a time so it really only took a couple of hours although, tedious.  I’m not sure who said quilting was relaxing, but this is not my idea of relaxing…

How I feel about cutting more squares…

But now, I am officially READY to start sewing!  I must say, I am a little nervous to make those first few stitches as Marley was to make those first few cuts.  I don’t want to screw it up and I don’t have any extra material or t-shirts, if I do screw up.  I know once I get started, I will be good to go, but it’s the first square that will be terrifying.  Here’s to hoping my sewing machine is forgiving and I’m not a total disaster!