Quilted table cloth that stays on table

One of the more substantial projects I have completed in the past few years was a quilted tablecloth for our coffee table. Way back before we had a child, we left the table bare. But alas the child came along and quickly scratched and dented the table forcing us to cover it. Of course, we didn't have a coffee-table-sized cloth so we folded a sheet to fit the table and put binder clips around the edges in an attempt to keep it on the table. As you can see, that didn't work so well.  

I had wanted for some time to make a quilted item with denim and had already collected old jeans from people in my local Buy Nothing group. 

Planning the project 

One of the main reasons to sew your own is that you can customize for your exact needs. I wanted a tablecloth that fit our table. The tablecloth needed to be thick enough to take abuse from the kid, but thin enough to balance a cup of coffee on. I also wanted the tablecloth to stay on the table, which I knew would be a challenge with my kid. 

Once I determined what I needed the tablecloth to do, I determined the size and shape of the finished project.  The table top measured 49 1/2 inches by 19 1/2 inches. I initially had planned slightly smaller, but the finished tablecloth ended up being 59 1/2  by 30 1/2 inches. 

I wanted shaping in the corners so I considered whether I would sew corner seams or add the shaping another way. I decided to sew a flat rectangle that I would gather slightly at the corner with hand sewing. 

The next step was to decide on the materials. I knew the top layer would be denim. I selected a piece of relatively unattractive upholstery fabric I had acquired as the batting or middle layer. I decided to use a duvet cover that I had purchased for $5 at a thrift shop for the bottom layer and binding. 

Piecing the denim 

I  cut the seams and worn and torn areas from the many jeans I had collected. I decided that the length of my quilt blocks would simply be the width of the final quilt.  

I created both wider and narrower blocks.  For the width of the larger blocks, I laid pieces of similar size together and made blocks that varied from 6 and 8 inches, plus a 1/4 inch seam allowance on each size. I also created narrow blocks that were 2 inches plus a 1/4 inch seam allowance on each side, totaling 2 1/2 inches. 

For the wider blocks, I cut the jeans to the width and then laid the pinned pieces right sides together and, using a denim needle, stitched using a 1/4-inch seam allowance. I pressed seams open as I went. The denim was easy to work with and while it took several days, the quilt top came together more quickly than I had anticipated. 

Once I had several blocks, I started stitching them together  (right sides together then pressing open) with a 1/4 seam allowance). Occasionally I laid the quilt top on the table to determine if my initial size calculations were correct. In doing this, I decided to add both length and width to the quilt. 

Once I finished the quilt top, I created my sandwich with the quilt top on top, the upholstery fabric in the middle and the duvet cover on the bottom. I cut the two bottom layers bigger than the quilt top because I knew that things could shift when I started stitching the layers together. I used plates from adjustable hand weights to ensure that everything was straight and taught. I pinned the layers together. 

I used a quilting foot to secure the layers. I started in the center and "stitched in the ditch" between the quilt blocks. I also stitched roughly in the middle of the wider blocks as well.  I also added some perpendicular seams as well.  The quilting was more arduous than I had expected. The three layers together were fairly bulky and took effort to navigate through my non-professional home machine. I had to fold and secure the edges with binder clips so  I could fit it through At some point I got a little sick of this part of the project and went onto one of my Facebook upcycling pages and asked if I could stop with the quilting stitches.  The replies I received said because I was using fabric in my middle layer instead of quilt batting, I could get away with less stitching than if I had been using batting, I was ok with that answer. 

Once the pieces were quilted together, I trimmed the edges of the bottom two layers.  

 A lot of fabric remained from the duvet cover, so I used that for the binding. I cut along the diagonal or bias in widths of 2 inches.  I folded and pressed it into 1-inch bias tape. I pinned one side to the quilt stiched it, folded it over and secured the other side.  

The coffee table had spindles in the middle so I knew I could secure the tablecloth to those. I stitched four leftover belt loops on the underside of the cloth to match the spindles' location. I threaded ribbon through it so that I could tie the cloth onto the table. 

This is a feature that I am really proud of and something you can't find in a store-bought item. After two years of use, I am pleased to say that although the tablecloth is not always straight, it stays on the table. 

Taming more chaos while upcycling

The blog post I wrote earlier this month on sew-your-own choas reducers is now the most popular post I have written. From that, I surmise I am not the only person who wants to tame the chaos in their house. I have more substantial projects that I would like to share, but I will wait on those so that I can share some more tips on reducing chaos with upcycled materials. 

Just before the turn of the new year, I realized that the downstairs drawers that held my sewing materials and the upstairs drawers that held my clothing were complete disasters. I have found that store-bought organizers never work for me in part because they are never the right size. So I organized them using upcycled materials. 

Vertical storage and old socks

Like many people, I read Marie Kando's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. While everything in the book sounded great, the only thing I actually implemented was storing clothes vertically.  Doing this allowed me to see everything, but the drawer would revert to chaos when I unfolded one of my many black pieces of clothing to see what it was or when the drawer was less full causing the vertically folded clothes to fall over. A few weeks ago, my son cleaned out his sock drawer and left several holey socks on his floor. He was adamant that I not mend them and they sat around for a few weeks because I could not think of a use for them. Finally, I had a burst of inspiration and decided I would cut the socks into rings and use them to hold my clothes together. 

I cut several socks, took each article of clothing out of my drawers, rolled them up and bound them with a sock ring. Then I put the clothing back in the drawer upright. The sock rings didn't constrict the clothing as much as a rubber band and keep the clothes  from becoming unfolded. Now, as pictured at the top,  I can see all the clothing in my drawers and they remain much neater. 

Sewing stuff, cardboard and berry containers

My sewing drawers are still a work in process as of today, but I have made several improvements to how I store ribbon, trim and scraps. Before the organizing project, the drawer was full of ziploc bags of ribbon, thread spools that didn't fit into the thread section of my sewing box and scrapsof various sizes. the times were getting all tangled up. 

I put the thread into take-out containers, preventing them from getting tangled up in other items. I folded several of my scraps vertically and placed them in berry containers. I spent the most time on ribbons and trim. I used a shoebox and cut cardboard to fit inside. I wrapped the ribbon and other trims on the cardboard and cut small notches in them so I could keep the ribbons from unraveling. I still have a lot of work to do on the sewing items, but one project at a time.

Sew your own chaos reducers

I find that store-bought organization containers never fit the space I have and just collect junk.  I am, however, a big fan of custom-made items. Over the past few years, I have made several items  I call chaos reducers. They are fabric pockets or baskets in the exact size I need them. I have made chaos reducers for television remotes, jar lids, pencils and plastic container lids.  

About a week ago I was looking in the cabinet that houses my blender, food processor and other items and I saw, well, chaos.  I have too much fabric and that is also creating chaos. So, I decided to feed two birds with one scone (because who actually wants to kill birds) so I whipped up a quick project to hang the grating and food processor slicing discs. 

I used an upholstery sample approximately 11.5 inches wide and 16.5 inches long with grommets pre-installed. The edges were already serged. For some reason, I really wanted the serged edges to be visible. Plus I didn't have enough width for a gusset construction, so I used construction techniques that might cause someone more expert to look askance. 

I started the project by laying down the two blades and folding the fabric to roughly fit and marking the fabric.  The pockets needed depth but the fabric was not wide enough so I  cut a strip 2 inches wide from the bottom.  I then cut the strip in half so had two about 2 inches wide and 5.25 inches long. 

I then serged the raw edges to keep the serge theme going. I folded over the top of the front part of the pocket  (or the bottom of the rectangle) about an inch and hemmed it. I then pinned on the stips flush to where the top of the pocket would be and I stitched about a quarter inch in. 

Then I folded the bottom of the rectangle up and I stitched on the other side of the stip from the inside. I could not stitch all the way down without catching parts of the pocket I didn't want to catch.  Then I hung it on the fridge to test it.  It gaped like crazy!

I thought through various options to reduce the gaping like installing a button and button hole. I eventually settled on quick and simple. My sewing machine has some decorative stitches I never had found an opportunity to use. So I tacked down the middle of the pocket with a few snow- flake stitches. 

That reduced the gaping quite a bit. I then hung the chaos reducer inside the cabinet using Command hooks and rearranged the items. Now everything fits and is more organized. 

Here are a few more chaos reducers I have made that hang in the kitchen. 

Low waste resolutions

If you want to make a New Year's resolution to reduce waste, but getting creative with the trash is not your cup of tea, here are a few ideas to generate less waste in 2024 that go beyond refusing straws and bringing your own bags to the store. These are all things my household has incorporated into our routines. 

1. Switch to solid shampoos and conditioners. There are a growing number of high-quality shampoo bars and conditioner bars available. These bars eliminate the large plastic bottles and reduce the need to transport water. I have thick but dry, hair that tangles easily. I use a moisturizing shampoo bar from  J. R. Liggetts and a moisturizing Hi-Bar conditioner.  While not cheap, the Hi-Bar conditioners are less expensive than the creamy conditioner I used to use. I purchase both locally because ordering from Amazon and all the accompanying packaging would defeat the purpose. 

2. Buy in bulk and bring your own containers. My local co-op Mississippi Market and the local zero waste store Tare Market allow customers to bring their own containers for dry goods. I regularly shop the bulk bins at both stores, weigh the containers before filling them, mark the tare weight and buy exactly the quantity I need. 

3. Turn old clothing into rags.  Reduce the need for paper towels by cutting up old clothing and towels into rags. Place them in the wash when you are done. Or if you use it for a heavy-duty job such as oiling a cast iron pan, simply throw it away. 

4. Bring your own containers to restaurants for leftovers. When we eat out, we bring our containers to the restaurants to bring home leftovers.  We also rinse out the thicker zip lock bags that granola or frozen fruit come in. I often tuck a bag that I have rolled up and secured with a twist tie in my purse so that I can use that as a takeout or bulk bag when I don't have a container. 

5. Use laundry strips and wool dryer balls. Like shampoo bars, laundry strips eliminate plastic bottles and water. As an added bonus, they take very little room to store. We use unscented Tru Earth strips.  In the warmer months, we often hang our laundry out to dry. In the colder months, we use wool dryer balls instead of fabric softener. Our dryer balls have lasted a decade. 

And for a bonus, please check out my blog post on normalizing reuse. 

Denim ornament upcycle

 

It's the holiday season. While my Jewish-Muslim family does not do a lot for Christmas, many of our friends celebrate. I had a few events to attend, a few gifts to give and a desire to be sustainable. My stash of scraps and materials to upcycle is also getting too big for the space that I have in my house.  Given all that, I decided to start crafting. 

While I seldom wear jeans because I can't find jeans that fit well (but someday maybe I will make a pair),  I have found that I  like to work with denim especially piecing together different colors. I found the directions to make quilted denim stars from Pillar Box Blue and thought I would make a few as Christmas gifts for a few of my friends who celebrate. 

The directions from Pillar Blox Blue were fantastic, so I won't repeat the step-by-step, but I will share my tweaks. 

I made the first star using a 7cm template as described in the blog, but that turned out a little large for a Christmas ornament so I created a 6 cm template for the additional ornaments I made. The seams on the first one were a little messier than I wanted so I switched my sewing foot to a quilting foot and that helped me sew more precise about 1/4 inch seams. I also chain-stitched the diamonds for multiple starts didn't have to waste time or thread. 

 

I basted the ribbon I wanted to use as the hanger on the edge of the right side of the denim star before I sewed the denim to the backing. That way the ribbon emerged nicely from the seam once I turned the star right side out. I also used small pieces of fabric to stuff the stars. The opening from which I stuffed it was pretty small so I used a funnel and a chopstick to help push the scraps in.  While I did attach a button to the center, the ornaments looked good without additional quilting stitches so I skipped that as well.

I  was pretty amazed at how well the stars turned out. And I was able to wrap the stars with upcycled materials before gifting. 

Upcycled holidays

This year it appears that we have reached 1.5 C of warming above preindustrial levels.  This level of temperature increase is not sustained at this point, but things don't look great for Mothership Earth. I am freaked out. I am also human and therefore a social creature. I have been thinking about recent temperature anomalies and I was invited to two holiday/birthday social gatherings this weekend. It can be hard to reconcile my desire to consume less and participate as a member of society and the consumption that entails. 

These two events involved gifting items to multiple people. So, as I often do, I decided to incorporate zero-waste principles. I did purchase a few new items such as a bottle of wine and books. But then I had fun getting creative with the garbage.  Instead of purchasing gift wrap that would be used once and then tossed or recycled, I chose to reuse other items. I wrapped a few gifts with an old map and even created bows with strips cut from it. 

The bottle of wine came in a bag so I cut a '5' and a '0' from a catalog that came in the mail and pasted them on to create a birthday theme. I also turned a coffee bag inside out to create a gift back for another item. I wasn't so thrilled with how simply turning it inside out looked so I cut the bag into a rectangle and transformed it into wrapping paper.  I cut a few narrow strips from the bag and ran scissors against it to create curly ribbon. 

I also made some upcycled gifts for these events, and you can read more about that in my companion blog post. 

When we exchange gifts within the immediate family, we now use cloth bags that we then save for the next time. We have been using them for the past few years.  

Upcycling the food scraps

Food waste in the United States is a problem. The Department of Agriculture estimates that 30 to 40 percent of the food supply eventually becomes waste.  Sometimes food is left unharvested in a farm field. Other times it spoils in a store or is thrown away by the consumer.  

I feel pretty good about our household composting routine, which involves composting at home in the warmer months and taking food waste to a local drop-off site in the colder months. But food cultivation requires inputs like land, water and energy for transportation. The most sustainable thing is to not waste at all. My family has work to do in this arena and I am striving to waste less food. Often this includes paying attention to what I have, processing things before they spoil, forgoing something tastier for leftovers and substituting ingredients in recipes for what I already have. I also am actively trying to find recipes to use items that would ordinarily go to the compost bin. Two examples are below.  

Orange peels

A panettone recipe I want to make in a few weeks calls for candied orange peels. In preparation, I  considered purchasing orange peels. But since I  cook a lot and know you can make a lot of things people usually buy from the store, I decided to google candied orange peel.  The recipes I found didn't seem difficult. My kid eats a lot of tangeries. I had to persuade him to save the peels, which might have been the hardest part of this project.  I also saved my own. After I had several saved in the refrigerator, I followed a recipe from Epicurious. I blanched the peels for a little less time than called for since I was using tangerines instead of navel oranges. I also halved the amount of syrup. I ended up with delicious candied orange peels that I had to put in the freezer before I ate them all. 

I also ended up with a jar full of orange-flavored sugar syrup, that I didn't know what to do with.  My kid asked what the jar of pee-colored water in the fridge was so I wasn't going to get him to drink a soda with the syrup.  A week or later I was making a limpa recipe that called for both honey and orange peel and I realized I could substitute the orange syrup for those two ingredients. Later,  I  substituted the orange sugar syrup for sugar in a pancake recipe so the jar is nearly gone.

Sushi ginger 

My family occasionally purchases grocery store sushi and does not eat all the pickled ginger (let's not talk about the non-recyclable plastic that it comes in). My spouse put unconsumed ginger in a couple containers in the fridge with no plans on what to do with it. The fridge was getting crowded and I thought "I need to do something with this ginger." So Google came to the rescue again. I found a recipe for salad dressing using pickled ginger.  I followed it loosely, not measuring. I blended toasted sesame oil, soy sauce, the pickled ginger and mirin and ended up with a lovely dressing that I used on roasted brussel sprouts. My son would not eat the sprouts but he did ask for some of the leftover dressing to use on other things. 

 

The easiest upcycle

Yes, I recently brought the used soap bars home from a recent hotel stay. I carried them in a bag which once held frozen fruit frozen fruit. About a year ago, I persuaded my spouse to switch from body wash to soap to eliminate plastics. Then a few weeks ago, while cleaning the bathroom, I discovered the container where he had put several soap remnants.

I used these remnants to do the easiest upcycle ever. I cut the soap up into small pieces using a knife. 

I put the scraps in a glass measuring cup and added a tablespoon or two of water. I had about a cup of soap pieces. I microwaved it at 60 percent power in 30 second increments until it was melty. You do have to watch it carefully- I did have some overflow. I poured the melty soap into the cups of a muffin tin and let it harden overnight.

Apparently, this process is called milling. So if your family wonders why you have soap bars that resemble peach yogurt, you can reply that these are fancy milled soap bars.

A trio of towel mends

 

Over the past week, I mended three towels. Two towels still had a lot of fluff. The other was simply beloved by my spouse, even though I would have cut it up to turn it into rags. Each towel was worn or ripped in a different way so I employed different mending techniques. 

Adding a strip

The brown and white towel had a simple rip along the non terry cloth strip. I don't know if the strip has a name. I reinforced the torn area with some zig zag stitches and then cut a strip of velour from my stash, covered the strip and used a zig zag to stitch around the perimeter.

Blues Clues mend

The first blue towel has two serious tears on it. I pinned a thin scrap over the holes and then I went back and forth over the area using the darning foot to close them up. Then I cut out patches of blue velour and sewed them on each side the towel using a zig zag stitch around the perimeter. I used an over cast stitch on the edges to finish it off. The final product reminded me of Blues Clues.

Binding

The third towel had fraying edges. In the past I had stitched fraying edges with a zig zag, but the towels looked messy. I decided to bind this one. I used washed and preshrunk quilting fabric from my stash. I decided I didn't need bias binding because the towel didn't have curves, the fabric remnant selected was narrow and I didn't want to do the extra work to make bias tape.

I simply cut three inch strips along the grain and joined them with a quarter inch seam. I wanted to make a tape rather than using a double folded edge.

I folded the tape in half and pressed the fold. I then unfolded and used the bias tape guide I had to fold the edges into the middle. I ended up with single fold non-bias tape, a term I just made up!

Next, I unfolded the tape and pinned it wrong side up flush with the towel edge. I folded the end under at the beginning.

I stitched a little to the outside of the fold since the non-bias tape did not have the shorter edge like commercial tape. I used thread I wanted to use up even though it did not match. I stopped a quarter inch from each corner and took it off the machine to fold down the corner so they were mitered. 

After I finished attaching the tape to the towel,  I folded over the tape, pressed and stitched the opposite side as close to the edge as I could. I used matching thread so the stitching was less conspicuous. It's an old towel so you can see my stitching was not perfectly neat.

These mending techniques will help me keep these towels out of the landfill for a few more years.

A long term project

Every once and a while I decide that rug making would be kind of cool. But it never goes as planned. I started this rug for the landing on my basement stairwell using a locker hook technique.  I thought it would take a few weeks. Two years later, my family laughs at me when I take out the project to work on it.

I am determined to finish this project some day. And I like the color scheme. So I am going to blog about it and hopefully you will join me in the journey.

To make this type of rug, you will need rug canvas, fabric to cut into strips, yarn or string and a locker hook. A locker hook looks like a needle on one end and a crochet hook on the other. I used canvas that had four squares per inch.

  

To begin, I took custom measurements of the space, which has some notches. When it is finally done, it will fit perfectly. I cut it the canvas leaving four or five excess rows at the edge. I hand stitched  two pieces of canvas together because neither piece I purchased was large enough. I overlapped several rows. I also covered the outside canvas with duct tape so it didn't poke me.

Then I started cutting one inch strips of fabric. I started with my son's old holey pants, then added torn sheets, socks and t-shirts to the mix. Several articles of old clothing have ended up in this project so far. I initially cute strips about an inch wide. I found that the thicker fabrics were hard to work with and started cutting them more narrowly. I tapered the ends and cut a small slit so I could later join the strips.

To start fabric to the canvas, I threaded the needle with the yarn and knotted it on the canvas. I decided the perimeter would be black.Then, I took the first strip of fabric and placed it under the canvas while keeping the hook on top of the canvas, then used the hook end to pull a loop through to the top. I left a tail so I could knot it with another piece of fabric later. To secure the loop I pulled the yarn through it. 

All subsequent stitches are made in the same manner. I joined the fabric strips as I reached the end of the one I was hooking. To do that I fed the second strip stop through the slit on the first, then threaded that end on the second strip through the other slit on the second strip and pulled it through.

This is what the finished stitches look like. Some day, I look forward to showing off the final rug.