The Raptors Quilt: My First Memory Quilt Project
My husband is a lifelong Toronto Raptors fan — and I mean lifelong. He has season tickets and goes to as many games as humanly possible. Over the years, he’s built quite the collection of Raptors shirts — some bought, some gifted, and many collected from games where they hand them out to the crowd. Eventually, the pile of shirts got so big that there was no way he could wear them all.
One day, he mentioned he’d seen T-shirt quilts before and wondered if I could make one from his Raptors gear. It was during the middle of the pandemic, when life had slowed down, so I figured it was the perfect time to give it a try.
That quilt became my very first T-shirt quilt project — and wow, did I learn a lot along the way! From cutting and stabilizing stretchy fabric to sewing pieces together neatly, it was definitely a learning experience. But it also sparked something for me — a love of creating quilts that hold meaning and memories.
The finished Raptors quilt still lives in our living room today and is a favourite to cuddle up under while watching the team play (and hopefully win!) on TV. I made it the year after the Raptors’ unforgettable 2019 championship win — when all of Toronto was still riding that incredible high.
I’ve included a few photos below — the shirts laid out on the floor while I planned the design, the quilt before it was quilted, and of course, the finished piece.
That first project will always hold a special place in my heart — it’s what started me on this quilting journey.
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laying out the cut shirts to decide on a layout
The T-shirts all sewn together
Here I have added a thick border and have basted the 3 layers of the quilt together with safety pins. This makes sure the quilt layers stay put when I put it through the sewing machine.
And here I am in our snowy Toronto backyard, showing off the finished quilt.
