Monday was rainy and cold. It sure was nice to have my new T-shirt quilt handmade by Fake Plastic Fish reader Colette Carrabba, who blogs at Carrabba’s World.

But let me backtrack a little.

Remember when I wrote about how the stuff on and around my desk was overwhelming me? A lot of you left some really great suggestions for ways to get organized. One of the most helpful came from Erika Barcott who wrote a whole post in response on her blog Redshirt Knitting and recommended the book, It’s All Too Much: An Easy Plan for Living a Richer Life with Less Stuff, by Peter Walsh. He recommends going through your stuff and keeping only 50% of it. He says that if things are important to us, we ought to treat them that way. Hoarding stuff away in drawers and boxes to be dealt with later only makes us feel overwhelmed in the present. While I don’t agree with his admonition to throw the rest away (we all know there is no such thing as “away”) I did take to heart the idea of doing some serious culling.

Unfortunately, my desk is not much better these days, but my T-shirt drawer is newly spacious. It used to be crammed full of Men’s style shirts that had sentimental value but that I would never wear because that style looks like crap on me. So I chose twelve shirts that were the most meaningful to me (one that I’ve had since 1988), took the rest to Goodwill, and set about finding a crafty person to sew the chosen twelve into a quilt for me, along with some scraps of fabric that I bought years ago for a project I never even started.

The first person I turned to was Cat Domiano from It’s A Green, Green, Green, Green World, who sewed the cloth napkins that Michael and I use in our house every single day. She recommended her sister Colette who, it turns out, had already made several T-shirt quilts and was happy to do this project.

I was careful to specify that I wanted organic cotton batting inside the quilt. Most batting these days seems to be made from polyester, and I wanted mine to not only be made from natural fibers but also organic to avoid the pesticides associated with conventional cotton. (Yes, I know I bought a conventional cotton jacket two days ago. No one’s perfect.) I ordered the batting from Organic Cotton Plus and had it shipped directly to Colette.

What a beautiful job she did! And she shipped the finished quilt back to me without any packing materials inside the box, per my request. Colette even asked me if I wanted the fabric scraps back and assured me that if I didn’t need them, she would reuse them as cleaning rags.

I asked her if she had a few words for Fake Plastic Fish readers about plastic, her Etsy Shop, and her blog. Here’s what she wrote:

I would definitely have to say that you are part of the inspiration behind my reduced plastic consumption. While I am not yet able to eliminate many of the plastics I would like to, it is an ongoing process and improves with time. I know that what I have managed to accomplish has inspired those around me in bits and pieces as well. Through my blog I bring my small steps to light, gladly sharing my progress. I hope that in my small way I am demonstrating that the elimination or reduction of plastic in a person’s life does not take place all at once but in small pieces and that it is possible!

Everything that I sell in my shoppe on Etsy is hand-made from cotton fabrics. I use thrift store finds, clothing and other re-used items when possible. When I package my creations for their new owners, I re-use packing materials as well. There may be plastic used in the packaging simply because that is what I have on hand and I want to give that bit of plastic one more use. I hope that the recipient will reuse the plastic packaging instead of tossing it out! In fact, I will add that to my thank you notes to the purchaser!

I’m just happy to be cozy and warm. Soots and Arya are happy with the quilt too!

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