recycled fabric potholders

I have been at a loss for a long time as to how to make use of recycled materials within my own aesthetic. Funny to hear, I am sure, as there is so much creative thought and work out there on the subject! I recently read Natalie Chanin's Alabama Stitch Book, and saw she was using recycled T-shirts to make the most sumptuous garments imaginable (I want them all), so off I went to the recycling center and picked up an armload of T-shirts in pretty colors, then sat on them for weeks wondering what to make.

The book had a project featuring a dishtowel made of T-shirt jersey, so at last one morning I lighted on the idea of potholders (I never have enough attractive potholders). I cut the jersey up into 8" squares using a wave-edge rotary cutter, sorted them into piles of five layers, and sewed them together with fancy stitches, using a scrap of LFN Ribbon as a center anchor and another as a loop. I made up 6 in well under an hour. Nice project!

thanks, Jane Brocket!

Last week Jane Brocket graciously wrote about my ribbons in her luscious blog, Yarnstorm. This is the second time she has been kind enough to do so and I get a little blast of what it must be like to have her life as my blog and my website are inundated with visitors from all corners of the world who stop in on her recommendation. Jane writes eloquently about domestic life and has the most sumptuously colored photos of -- well, this week, tulips -- one could hope for. I won't lift one here but by all means visit her and see a color maestro in action.