Upcycling Your Quilts
We get many customers asking us to repair old quilts. Some can be given a face lift with a patch or new binding and continue their normal life as a quilt. Some are beyond repair due to wear, sunlight damage, thin or poor quality fabric, too much pet love, bugs, etc. But what do you do if some of it is salvageable? The answer is to upcycle it! For the parts of the quilt that are fine, ask yourself: how big is that area? What is the shape? Can it become a pillow? A wall hanging? Or can part of it be included in a new quilt? If you made it to the Virginia State Fair last month, you may have seen this amazing quilted coat made by our very own Myriah van de Kraats.
The original quilt was made by her great great grandmother. Myriah found a pattern that would work and carefully constructed her coat which not only includes pockets and a hood, but is reversible! Not surprisingly, her coat won first place for both her class and division, but also won a Heritage Quilt Award from the company that published the coat pattern she used.
What else in our world of sewing and quilting can be upcycled? T-shirt quilts are a great example. We’ve been collecting empty thread spools for months now. Some got strung and hung in one of our front windows. Some may become garland for a Christmas tree. What other projects can you think of that breathes new life into something that has lost its original function?
Did you know we also collect your fabric scraps? A local husband and wife team tirelessly make pet beds for local animal shelters and stuff them with scraps. (Although clothing scraps are not suitable for health reasons, sleeves and bottom cuffs of t-shirts can be used.) Long skinny fabric scraps of roughly 1” width are woven by the husband into rugs like the one in front of our register counter. Due to popular demand, he’s agreed to teach a class! Look for dates in future newsletters.
At QA, we know you have a choice of shopping local vs. the monster jungle of prime online. We sincerely appreciate your business – it’s what keeps us open! And as the end of 2021 approaches, so too does the holiday rush. You may have heard that supply chains in many industries are still challenged. That definitely applies to us. To encourage early shopping, the small businesses in Lakeside are once again banding together to collectively host "Holly Jolly" on Friday, Nov 5th and Saturday, Nov 6th. Many shops will be open until 9pm! Stop by QA on these days and we will help you make a cute button ornament. Kids welcome!
Holiday fabrics on sale this week - 20% off!
New classes coming for holiday gifts. Stay tuned for dates.
Also keep an eye out for a new feature in future newsletters - our employee spotlight. Get to know the wonderful staff at QA with a new bio each week.
Happy sewing everyone,
Phyllis and the QA staff
