Baby L's City Traffic Quilt

When the October/November 2012 issue of Quilters Newletter came out with the City Traffic Pattern by Pam Rocco, I knew immediately that I wanted to make it, so when we found out my nephew's family was expecting a baby boy, I got to work. This pattern was so much fun to work on--kind of liberated piecework, but it can be more structured, too, if you want to do it that way. I decided to change the setting a bit. Pam's quilt had three rows of vehicles set vertically. I wanted four rows (two lanes of traffic each way) without it getting too big, so I set them horizontally, which actually makes her quilt horizontal (kind of) and mine vertical if you get what I mean. Hard to explain, but you'll see what I mean if you look at her pattern. 

Before I planned the colors, I looked for some car fabric for the back and picked On Track by P&B textiles. Then I sorted through my stash to find solids to coordinate. Fun, fun, fun, and my sewing room looked like a fabric explosion while I picked through everything. I bought a light gray fabric with some sketchy lines for the background and a darker gray for the sashes and borders. 

The finished rows were 6 inches high and the sashes were 5 inches (I think) with outer borders 6 inches (maybe?) Finished size was probably a little over 45 by a little over 50. When I make quilts, I figure out yardage and block sizes and other things on scrap paper that ends up who knows where when I'm done. Then, if I ever want to make a quilt of the same design, I have to start all over--WHY DO I DO THAT?? (This blog is supposed to make me keep better track, so I hope to do better in the future.)

I used leftovers to extend the backing fabric and used backing fabric for the binding, which is machine sewed since I figure it will get washed a lot. I used Quilter's Dream Cotton Select for batting and meandered quilted on my treadle with Superior King Tut Cotton in Temple. 

I got the quilt done just in time for L's birth on August 7. I picture him when he's a little older racing his toy cars around the borders.