Ben's quilt

Ben's quilt, originally uploaded by Hazelnutgirl.

When my niece Rebecca was born a couple years ago I made her a small cot quilt for Christmas from Heather Ross' Rabbits and Racecars fabric. Then her brother Ben came along 6 months ago so I thought I should try another one. I love this fabric hugely, it's great fun to trace along the roads, looping around and looking at all the little cars. My favourite is the car that's rolled and is lying on its roof for all the world like a beetle on its back (the yellow one in the middle bottom third). I couldn't bear to cut into the fabric and disturb the traffic flow so I decided to leave it whole and quilt along the roads. That was such a no-brainer that even Hazel suggested it quite independently! I borrowed a better sewing machine from my friend Jesse (and am now even more dissatisfied with my old one!) and embarked on free motion sewing. There are some distinctly dodgy bits and wobbles and uneven stitch length, but the design is so forgiving that it doesn't actually matter. Love that. The quilting gives the fabric a lovely dimensional quality that's even better than I'd imagined. I'm going to bind it in orange, put a label on it and that's done and dusted.

Thanks very much for all your thoughtful and interesting replies on my money and crafting post. I really enjoyed reading through them and thinking about what you all had to say. There were a lot of perspectives but I think what I came away with was a real desire amongst you not to be sucked in by the pretty blogs and into spending money and to do it the thrifty way. So it seems to me that there IS a divide in this respect, whether it's driven by income or simply attitude. I have to admit that I come down on the money side of things more than I should, I just don't have that op-shop mojo and am willing to spend money to compensate for that lack of initiative and time. But I could put more effort into using what I've got before buying new, which I find hard for some reason - probably deeply psychological and Freudian! It's great to read about all of you who DO manage that and it inspires me to try harder. It's one thing to save buttons and trims and feel all thrifty like I do, and another to actually USE them! I think it might be my New Year's resolution. Ok, so I don't actually do those anymore as a result of bitter experience and failure in the past, but it's a good thing to aim for.