Wednesday, August 13, 2008

A Funeral and Old Shirts

Holy smokes, have things been nuts around here lately! Since March, we've had 4 deaths on my hubby's side of the family; an aunt, his brother, a distant relative, and on Friday, his uncle. Our heads are still spinning from all of it. Just when things seem to settle down, something else pops up. This is one of the tougher seasons of our lives thus far. We are thankful that each of these relatives claimed Christ as King. To some degree, that eases our sorrow.

While attending funerals have been a big part of my absence, we've also had many things to catch up on around our house. Our garden is keeping me very busy. We're having a wonderful harvest and are very excited to improve our planting next year. Another thing I'm working on is cleaning out hubby's closet. He's lost about 35 pounds since February and has outgrown many of his old clothes. One thing I need to make use of are several of his company logo shirts. He doesn't need these anymore since the company changed names several months ago and the shirts are really too large for him now. They are good quality shirts and I'm wondering if I can somehow recycle them. They are short-sleeved, polo type shirts with the company emblem on one side. He also has a few good quality long sleeved shirts with the emblem on the side. He always pushes them to the back of his closet so I don't see him ever wearing them again. All of the shirts are made of good quality cotton that is kind of thick. It's not practical to keep them for "around the house" shirts because they are just too hot due to the thickness.

This is where each of you come in. I need some good ideas for recycling these shirts. I thought of cutting them up for cleaning rags but I'm just not sure I could do that. I know I could always donate them but I'd really like to recycle them for our use. I'm thinking that the material is strong enough to use for making a few small tote bags or something like that. If you have ideas or simple patterns to suggest, please do so. I'm trying hard to be more deliberate about the things I throw out. I need to think outside the box more often so that I don't get rid of things that could really be useful!

6 comments:

Nessa said...

I had some like that and i used them for the dogs. As much as i love them, i cannot stand to have them rubbed down with my bathtowels after their bath or if they got rained on just long enough to need wiped off. Soooooo I cut up some shirts i had like these along one seam and cut the sleeves off and used those for rags to wash the car. The shirts absorb enough water to do what I want, the towels don't smell like wet doggie and my car is cleaned without the kids taking my good washrags. I'm happy.

Aunt kat said...

Since you are interested in making crafty items, why not use these shirts as a backing for a nice homemade quilt. Since they are of the good quality you spoke of, they would make perfect quilt squares of whatever size you wanted to make and provide you with a conversation piece as you enjoy their warmth.

cats as pet said...

Same opinion as above. Thanks for sharing this post.

Joyful Days said...

Coming in late to say I am so sorry for all of the losses your family has been through.

No good idea on the shirts. We have all sorts of logo shirts from hubs different companies past.

gail@more than a song said...

I kept all my kids old t-shirts to make something I'd seen or read about...cut them into strips and then tie them onto a rug canvas or something like that, to make a rag rug of sorts. Cute idea but it took forever to fill up part of it for a throw rug and I got frustrated with it! My daughter wanted us to make a t-shirt quilt out of some of her college ones but we never did....so you might could do totes or a lap quilt or something.

Lisa Russell said...

I just wrote about that... http://tinyurl.com/5tbj4z I've been collecting mine in a box, I think I'm going to cut them into strips and crochet a rug or something. Maybe a tote bag- ooh, a bunch of grocery sacks maybe.