Transportation Baby Quilt

Finished: Transportation Baby Quilt
Finished size - about 48" square

Here's a close up of the baby announcement, added to the quilt by scanning and printing on Transfer Artist Paper

I've been working all week to finish this baby quilt in time to take to a party, and I finished at least four hours before the party- I'm getting rusty, because usually I finish things and the situation is: Mr. Hunting Creek has the car running already, we're running late, and everyone in poised for takeoff. I even had time to wrap it nicely, watch the Preakness with a glass of cold iced tea, and write a nice note in the card.

The quilt is my own design, if a square in a square log cabin can even be said to be original. I was inspired by a quilt in Modern Log Cabin Quilting, but mine is made differently. Let's say it's my own interpretation. If you'd like to make something similar, here's a run down of what I did.
We went to the Variety Store nearby; they have a large selection of quilting fabric, and I had a specific theme in mind. I bought half yards of the green road fabric, the black and white airport, the yellow train print, one yard of the plain blue, and two yards for the back of a pretty yellow train themed stripe (I didn't need all two yards, but it is nice to have some extra in case the quilt grows.)
The blue road map and classic car print was from stash, as were the red and white dot fabrics and everything else. It's nice to have options. My rule was - no two blocks exactly alike, but everything will go together, and one block will have the baby announcement.
I chose 15 4 1/2 inches squares for the centers (and one saved for the baby picture. So there are 16 centers. I framed those squares with the blue, cut 1 1/2 inches wide. The second round was the same prints as the squares, cut 2 1/2 inches wide, with a few calming blender prints thrown in for a place for the eyes to rest. Then I used the red and white dots as sashing, cut one and one half inches wide - I wanted it the same width as the blue. I quilted it very simply to frame the blocks. There's a lot going on here. so no fancy stitching needed. I love how it turned out and when I was done, I imagined it all soft and faded and dragged around all over as little kids do, as a treasured wooby blankie.
If you've never worked with the Transfer Artist Paper, here's what I did to transfer the inage. First I scanned the baby announcement, and then in my HP Image Manager (the software that came with my All In One Printer) I reversed the image and crapped it as necessary. Then I printed a couple on paper to make sure I had made it the right size. Then I printed it on the Transfer Artist Paper, and transferred the image to plain white cotton using the instructions included in the package.I was glad that I had made two copies (one for practice) because I learned that the iron has to be HOT. My first one wasn't perfect, but my second one was. Save the trimmed parts of the TAP, you can also paint or draw on it and transfer those as well, so I save my scraps for a future project.
The new parents loved the quilt so everyone is happy. Now to clean up my sewing area and plan my next project.