Finished Transportation Quilt

 I have been working on the transportation quilt I am making for our grandson for some time. He was turning two and I wanted to finish it in time for his birthday.  Not that he would know or care, but I wanted to get it done by then.

      

I found some absolutely adorable fabric online with cartoon workers and construction vehicles. What did we do before the internet???

As with all the appliqués I have done, I stitched around the designs as part of the quilting process.  I did most of the quilting in free motion.  Then I added a binding using the same fabric I used for the backing. 

I was unhappy with the bus and plane square.  I remade them and then saved the originals. This is explained in earlier posts.

I quilted each one with batting and scrap fabric for the backing. I sewed them together with right sides facing, leaving part of one side open. 

 I turned them right side out and then stuffed the pillow with poly fill stuffing and stitched it closed. I had a matching pillow!

       

I managed to finish before his birthday.  He is now using his new quilt.  I don't know if he appreciates it or not, but I guess time will tell.

      

Mug Rug Gifts

 I was planning a trip to Pasadena soon.  I grew up there and have friends and family that I haven't seen in quite some time.  When my mother was living in Southern California I went about 4 times a year to see her. Now that she's gone, my trips to the west coast are to visit our granddaughters in Northern California. 

I thought it would be fun to make a mug rug for some of the people I am visiting.

I already sent my former roommate and host for my visit a mug rug. But she has a beloved granddaughter, so I decided to make one for her to give as a gift.  What little girl doesn't like a unicorn?  I used a Cricut design for the template and cut it out using Steam-A-Seam to place it on a white square. Purple and pink are the usually good colors for little girls.  

The  super cute bug fabric on the back makes it reversible and it has a lot of purple to go with the binding.

I have a friend who is a writer.  She gets the book case. I didn't have a pattern for this so it took a few tries to get the dimensions right. The bird design is from another project.

My friend Mary grew up near me, four houses away. I have known her as far back as I have memories.  When we were kids we decided we should have a club.  A bunch of neighbor girls got together and had meetings and even put on a carnival to raise money we donated to a worthy cause.  We agonized over a name. The Beatles were popular then, so we tried out bug names and ended up with the Ladybug Club. I found a ladybug design on Cricut and used that.

There were many kids on our block and we played outside together after school and all summer.  We were in and out of each other's house all the time. Mary's mother was a big part of my childhood.  So I wanted to make her a rug, too.   She was a librarian, so she needed a book theme, too.  I still have some fabulous antique book fabric I used to make some masks at the beginning of the pandemic, so I chose some for her. Both sides have books, one with Shakespeare as I don't know what her reading tastes are.

And lastly I made a drone mug rug.  My daughter-in-law and son are engineers on drones being built for the Air Force. I pulled up a bunch of photos online and used one to make the template for a drone mug rug for my daughter-in-law. I hope she likes it. But if not, she has a whole office full of people to pass it off to!

I finished this post after I returned from my trip.  My daughter-in-law liked my drone mug rug and asked if I could make a similar one for a friend. I did so happily.  I really need to make one for myself!  I just keep giving them away!  Hmmmm.  I wonder what pattern I should use...

Honey Pecan Cream Cheese

 I recently had bought some bagels. This is a moderately big event for me as there are no places in our town.  I love a Nutella bagel, Burt I also like them with a honey pecan cream cheese. Sadly, I haven't been able to find any.  I can find regular cream cheese and savory cream cheese flavors, but not the honey pecan ones.  

I don't know if it is COVID related, supply chain issues, or what the issue is, but I decided to make my own.  How hard could it be?

So I bought a tub of plain Philadelphia cream cheese and made some.

Honey Pecan Cream Cheese

1/2 cup cream cheese

1 Tablespoon honey

2 Tablespoons pecans

I toasted some pecans in the toaster oven. Keep an eye on them. They can go from not toasted enough to burnt pretty quickly.  I set the oven to 300° and only kept them in a few minutes.  After cooling, chop finely.

Mix the cream cheese, honey and chopped nuts.  That's it.

I made this after breakfast, so I wasn't hungry enough to toast a bagel to try it out. I placed a small amount on an animal cracker. It was delicious.  It was a bit sweeter than I was used to, so I may use a bit less honey next time I make it.  And I will make it again.

Place the flavored cream cheese in an air tight container and keep it in the refrigerator.