road map quilt

by Karen
(Jacksonville, Florida)

I made this crib-sized quilt for a friend's son who loves trucks. I used fabrics that have a lot to look at (cowboys, frogs, farm animals, etc.) so he could use it to play memory or I Spy as well as using it as a play mat.

This quilt is machine pieced. The "roads" are pieced, not appliqued. I made the template myself after being inspired by a quilt I saw at weewonderfuls.com. I based the template on a traditional "drunkard's path" design. Making the template was the hardest part of the process (making the roads meet up), but piecing it was a lot easier than I thought piecing curves would be.

The quilting is also done by machine--I stitched in the ditch around the roads, echoed that line, and then added circles. The dashed line down the center of the roads is embroidery floss.

From start to finish this quilt took about three months, but I never worked on it for more than half an hour here or there (I'm busy chasing after my own little one). This was the second quilt I made, and I think a more experienced quilter could make a quilt like this in a week or two.

More details and more pictures here.