Cuddly Construction Vehicles

I had two large graphic fabric panels of construction equipment that I wanted to sew into throws rather than wall hangings. My son works in the design/construction business and his son is just emerging from a toddler's crazy-about-building-vehicles phase. True, the Minecraft video game has somewhat superseded my now seven-year old grandson's big equipment infatuation. I am slightly late in sewing to meet his peak interest level. I may have missed my window, but I just could not let these big graphic panels go to waste. These were the two panels I had by Riley Blake Designs: A CAT® Dump Truck and a CAT® Excavator. Each is 36" tall and 43" wide and is digitally printed. Reluctant to abandon these stunning fabrics, I justified my belated sewing of these panels by couching them as a father/son throw duo. As throws they needed to have a soft backing and soft borders in order to be cuddly and tactilely desirable. Thinking snuggly fabrics for the backing would be appealing, I bought some minky in camel for the dump truck and some minky in ash for the excavator and wrapped it around to the front. 

Hoping to expand my skills by doing the wrap-around self-binding technique, I suspected the corner miters would be my challenge. As it turns out, they were a piece of cake when I found a YouTube tutorial from ShabbyFabrics for a baby receiving blanket. Using Cuddle® by Shannon fabric for the backing was my waterloo. Per the Missouri Star Quilt Company:

The term minky refers to any plush microfiber fabric made from 100% polyester fibers. Cuddle is the brand name of minky fabric by Shannon fabrics. While you may find minky fabric for sale that isn’t made by Shannon, the truth is, Shannon Cuddle fabric is the highest quality minky fabric around. 

I had purchased Cuddle® minky for the plush, and so skimping on fabric quality was not an issue. I knew to be cautious with this project because I remembered I had sewn with a minky fabric before with not-particularly-stellar results as described in my 11/16/17 post. One of the four mitered corners on that project had been a disaster. This project all four of my miters were great. It was sewing the Cuddle® to the cotton along the four straight edges that was a struggle. The difference in stretchiness between a flexible minky fabric and a woven cotton fabric was a challenge to be conquered when seaming the two together. I pinned the dickens out of the seam, and still had problems. Here is my analysis of the issue.

Cuddle® is 60" wide and is very stretchy perpendicular to the selvage (white words in previous diagram) but — to my surprise — very non-elastic parallel to the selvage, even after cutting off the selvage. The woven cotton panels were the opposite; stretchy perpendicular to the selvage (black words in previous diagram) and stiffer parallel to the selvage (black words in photo). The flexible Cuddle® direction against the straight of grain of the woven I could handle with sufficient care, which as it turns out, were the shorter, vertical sides. I eased in the Cuddle®. The crossgrain of the woven against the unforgiving Cuddle® direction was a disaster, which as it turns out were the longer, horizontal sides. I tried with the woven fabric against the feed dogs and the Cuddle® against the feed dogs, either configuration to no avail, even though I had been scrupulous with cutting the two fabrics equal lengths. Easing in the woven was not working. I finally clipped tiny snips along the length of the Cuddle to introduce a bit of give and tugged my heart out. It did not come out perfect but certainly very acceptable. The  following photo is before any pressing or quilting. Closeups of the lower left and upper right corners reveal that the mitered corners were not a problem.

The ash-backed excavator went more smoothly than the camel-backed dump truck. I knew where the trouble spots were and that they were not at the miters where I was concerned. I'd cut the Cuddle® bigger by 11" on all fours sides of the woven panel. The wrap around borders were a generous 5½" wide. The finished throws measured ~54" wide by ~47" tall.

The next step I feared was quilting the center region. My plan was to just outline the truck and the excavator to hold the backing and front fabrics together and call it good. Mainly, I just wanted to smooth out those wrinkles. Theoretically, since there are no feed dogs on my long arm, there should be fewer issues. I practiced first with some Cuddle® scrap and the test worked out smoothly enough that my concerns were not justified. I also added some freeform lines contouring the clouds, or more specifically, the billows of stirred up dust. As a finishing touch, I did add a label with my name and the year on the lower front corner of each throw, using dark brown grosgrain ribbon.

Father and son both liked the gifts. Dan and William snuggled up together to watch football. Then my grandson decided he liked both throws and appropriated his dad's excavator as well as his own dump truck. William wrapped the dump truck around himself as a cape when he climbed the stairs to bed.

Seeing the reception the throws got, I was glad I had persevered in making them, even though I was at the outer reaches of a child's window of interest. Grudgingly, I even admit that the fluff and furry bits scattered throughout my sewing room, left behind from the Cuddle® plush, were worth the mess.

Make It Merry Month Six

At last, the sixth and final month of my Block of the Month commitment is here and I have completed Block #10 and Block #11.  Only one of each bock was required. The first five months had eight blocks each and this month had only two blocks. I still have the assembly and quilting of 42 blocks ahead of me, but 100% block completion is still a milestone I wanted to acknowledge. 

Theses are the two blocks, each measures 6½ "

In make the HSTs for these blocks I wound up with these four extras. They would make a nice pinwheel block although I do need to decide if I want the same red blades opposite each other or the same white blades opposite each other. I cannot have both. That is unless I make more HSTs and I certainly have enough leftover fabric to do so.

Can you locate Block #10 and Block #11 from Month Six? That is not very hard since they are each part of the bow.

I am super happy to have reached this block assembly phase on time and under budget. I purchased no more fabric nor tools. Assembling, adding borders, and FMQing will be the topics of future blog posts. My goal is to complete this quilt for Christmas Season 2025.

Make It Merry Month Five

In Month Five, the Make It Merry assignment was to make four Block #8's and four Block #9's. I just got a notice that my Month Six installment is due to arrive in the mail this weekend, so I better started on Month Five so as not to get behind. I am reminded of a saying by Karen Brown of Get It Done Quilts that, "My main goal for myself this year is to stop feeling like I am behind." A large part of the truth in that sentiment is attitude. But also, part of it is staying aware of those " _____ of the Month" things I signed up for. 

Block #8 had a lot of cream/tan and very little red. The cream/tan has subtleness in the use of three varied "white" fabrics. I liked that difference from past blocks. Variety is the spice of life. (As a bit of irrelevant trivia, per Wikipedia, Variety is the Spice of Life is also the name of 1939 comedy film. The plot is that when her composer husband loses interest in her, an ordinary housewife turns into a seductive vamp to try and win back his affections.) Also there were only four HSTs per block which is a relief. Making them a bit oversize is great for accuracy, but the trimming them to size can become tedious.  Here are the four 6½ " blocks, rotated as they will appear in the quilt.

Block #9 had a lots of greens and was overall dark, in stark contrast to Block #8. Once again, variety is the spice of life and an aspect of this project that kept it interesting.  This block had A thru G to cut out and so went a little more quickly than Block #8 which had A thru I. If you noticed there is an "0" instead of a "D" in this tray you are very observant. My "D" went AWOL. I am not concerned. My "C" had been gone for a couple weeks before showing up between two stacked trays. I could have used the "D" from my blue Alphabitties but I rationalized that "0" looks somewhat like a "D" but with the sharp edges smoothed over. 

These are the components of the basic nine-patch layout of Block #9 followed by an image of the four blocks assembled. This was an interesting approach to getting a square (red), within a square (mint), within a square (medium green) look. I've photos for this intermediate step for Block #9 but not for Block #8. Different stages of my step-by-step my assembly process for earlier blocks can be found in my posts for Month One (6/14/25), Month Two (6/21/25), Month Three (8/16/25) and Month Four (9/1/25).

Can you locate the four Block #8's and the four Block #9's from Month Five? Hint: Four blocks are central and four blocks are on diagonals. I kind of gave it away the way I photographed the Block #8's all gathered together; but you will still have to hunt some to find the Block #9's. And YAY! I finished Month Five before Month Six arrived!

Halloween Ornaments

I was tidying my sewing room and found eight ~4" squares with a Halloween theme in one of my many piles. They were leftovers from Raven and Pumpkin Placemats panels designed by Andrea Tachiera for Northcott Fabrics. I'd made the placemats five and six Halloween seasons ago as described in my blog posts for 10/24/20 and 10/23/19. Four squares on each of the two panels were intended for coasters, which I do not think are needed when there is a placemat. Anyway, I intended to repurpose those "coasters" as ornaments, and yet, they lingered on for years.

It is still Halloween, but even if it were not, I decided to stop shifting those squares around between piles and sew them up. My inspiration was a thought that kept trailing through my brain like an ear worm. The phrase "Give your self the gift of getting this done" is from a YouTube video of Just Get It Done Quilts by Karen Brown. Within the first 3½ minutes of the video Karen showed items she'd been pleased to complete that fit this "gift" category: a pin cushion kit, a decorated tray, a heating pad insert, a small kit she'd been given, and a notebook cover. Sewing something fun and quick is indeed a gift to yourself.

When I cut the images out of the panel, I stayed an ⅛" beyond the outer edge and used a ¼" seam to sew them face to face. Initially, I futzed around in my stash to find a suitable backing a material. I did find black and white checks, like one of the pumpkins, and a few other golds. (I could not help noticing, though, that I had created more piles to clean up.) Then I talked some sense into myself. Just make four ornaments; you do not need eight! I cut 4½" lengths of black grosgrain ribbon to use as hanging loops, centering each at the top between two face-to-face images.

Once I'd sewn along the edges, leaving an opening at the bottom, I turned the ornaments right sides out. I pressed the ¼" seam along each side of the open edge before starting to stuff. That crease makes it easier to whip stitch the opening closed afterward. The spider and bats squares are shown clipped in preparation for the whipstitch phase.

Here they are — SPIDER, BATS, PUMPKINS, and RAVEN — ready to be hung on the china cabinet near the placemats. PUMPKINS is my favorite. SPIDER is my least favorite... ewww!

Today, I should have been using my time to read my book for book club, which meets three days from now. Instead I discovered, cut out, sewed, stuffed, and whipstitched these ornaments and published this blog post. The experience was a guilty pleasure that was indeed a gift I gave myself. I will undoubtedly have to lose some sleep to finish that book before the club meeting, but today was worth it.

Three More Frank Pillows

I'd made a pillow from this Lella Boutique Frank pattern and blogged about it in my posts for 9/24/25 and  10/1/25. It worked up quickly so I decided to make others. I pretty much used the same fabrics but experimented with the FMQ. I improved my time with the cutting out by noticing I could cut strips and sub cut those. Here are three more Franks waiting to be FMQ'd. The coloration is subtle but the center Frank is a slightly more yellow hue of green. I could get two Frank faces out of one fat quarter.

I have never read the story of Frankenstein but I did know that Frankenstein is the name of the scientist/creator and the green guy himself was called either creature or monster. What I did not know, until I read a plot summary, was that the creature started out somewhat kind, initially rescuing a young girl from drowning. Humans, horrified by his appearance, treated him poorly and only then did he turned vindictive. I like to think that my three Franks represent "creature" in his early friendly stage. I also learned that his green color arose from his portrayal in a movie because the green makeup used in the 1931 film was applied to made him look pale and cadaverous on black and white film. Unlike Kermit the Frog, Frankenstein was not born that way. Even so, the result is still "♫ It's not Easy Being Green ♫".

For my second Frank, I used a HQ Clamshell template. Initially I though it would be too formal but I like the way it turned out. I chose the 2" size twosome on the right and stitched them in from the bottom up.

Then, even after my exhaustive review of rulers for the first Frank in my post for 10/1/25, I caved and bought a Wave E ruler. The Handi-Quilter website no long carries this ruler so I bought it from another online store that happened to stock it. Maybe HQ has just not gotten around to renaming it but wanted to have it in my collection in case it became unavailable. Yes, it is long (12" instead of 8"), but I plastered the back with quite a few sandpaper tabs and it stayed in place for me fine while quilting.  I used the side with the more squiggly of the waves and sewed the waves across Frank's face from the bottom up. The yellow pieces of tape reminded me how far up to space the next wave above the one beneath it. The FMQ went quickly... far faster than those clamshells. The result is a different look, but I liked it as well.

 

For my third Frank I considered vertical scallops since the other previous patterns had been horizontal. I also considered a curved edge squares block design and compared the two by sketching on clear sheets to audition. I opted for the scallops.

I did need to struggle and scratch my head a bit to get the scallops spaced as I wanted them and facing each other in pairs, but it was worth it. I used the HQ Mini Scallop Ruler and I am pleased with the results.

I forgot to put a label on the pillow I made for myself to keep but since these three are giveaways I did not want to skip that step. Should I name them all Frank? Do pillows need a name like quilts? Titles like Frank 1, Frank 2, and Frank 3 presumed a hierarchy and I did not want that. I considered Frankenstein, Frankly, Frankincense, Franklin, Let's Be Frank, and Frankfurter. After some thought (more thought than the topic merited) I decided on FRANK for each of them. After all, they will be in different households and there would no confusion or cases of mistaken identity. I also wanted small corner labels to be short: FRANK and DIC 2025. The labels are diagonal across the two upper corners on the back. All pillows have the same green spider web backing fabric and a zipper in the bottom.

Here is the trio of Franks all perched side by side before being sent off to their new homes. Each has his custom unique quilting pattern: waves, clamshells, or scallops. I had fun experimenting and practicing on every one. Can't you just hear those three Franks singing to the tune of We Three Kings?

We three Franks / of Halloween,

Not ghosts or pumpkins / instead we are green.

We're monsters forever / ceasing never,

To create / a BOO-ti-ful scene.

Woobles Crocheted Creeper

My grandson is into the video game Minecraft and wanted a character from the game, a Creeper, crocheted for him. Woobles are amigurumi crochet kits that comes with exquisite step by step video instructions for a wide variety of figures. My daughter sent me a kit for the figure Isaiah wanted. I began crocheting it, faithfully followed along on the video, using the soft yarn provided. The yarn has great quality as it has a good weight to it and does not split. With the help of my iPad, a blocky green critter began to take form.

The facial features, eyes and mouth, are provided and attach with a snap-on safety ring and cone attachment method. I hesitated before doing this step. Once snapped on, the pieces cannot be removed — hence the concept of safety. I watched the video several times; the placing and affixing was no biggie. My hesitancy was merely my initial lack of confidence. Once I forged ahead, my Creeper with two eyes and a mouth came to be. I think his mouth is more of a a mustache... but what do I know?

Next up was crocheting the four legs. These are itty bitty parts, only five rounds but I kept losing count and having to start over again. I think I made seven legs before succeeding in producing four legs. And just like with the eyes, I paused before attaching the legs. The instructions were clear, so clear and detailed, that I did feel a teensy-weensy bit overwhelmed.

But what is a Creeper without legs? Those legs were the final step and I finished him off. Here is the completed Creeper. This is going to the same grandson who loved the Wooble Axolotl (post for 1/22/24).

While crocheting this project I did learn some interesting facts about Creepers and also some video game terminology. Per a Wikipedia Creeper explanation:

The character model that later became the creeper was first created on August 20, 2009, as a result of a coding error when creating the pig mob in the early pre-alpha stages of Minecraft's development. The game's creator, Markus Persson, accidentally mixed up the dimensions of the model, swapping the length and height. Instead of deleting the result, Persson instead stated "I'll keep it for a creepy creature", and later added a green texture based on the in-game leaves texture to the model, gave it aggressive AI, and turned it into a hostile mob.

I also learned that Minecraft is a sandbox video game. What is that? Per Wikipedia's sandbox explanation:

A sandbox game is a video game with a gameplay element that provides players a great degree of creativity to interact with, usually without any predetermined goal, or with a goal that the players set for themselves. Such games may mostly or totally lack any objective, and are sometimes referred to as non-games or software toys. ... The term "sandbox" derives from the nature of a sandbox that lets people create nearly anything they want within it.

I really did sew on all four legs. Here is proof. I used a pair of hinged mirrors from my quilting tools to show several views of the Creeper at once.

Let's hope my grandson does not want an entire mob of Creepers. One was fun to crochet; it did not take that long. But I'd rather get back to my sewing. The mirror view gave me an idea. Maybe I should send him a pair of hinged mirrors like mine so he can create his own mob of Creepers. 💚

Further terminology update:
I just learned that the term mob in Minecraft does not necessarily mean a large violent group. Instead it stands for a "mobile non-player character". Specifically

Creepers are hostile mobs (mobile non-player characters) that spawn in dark places. Instead of attacking the player directly, they creep up on the player and explode, destroying blocks in the surrounding area and potentially hurting or killing the player if they are within the blast radius.

So in retrospect, one Creeper is enough as long as it is in blasting distance. Live and learn...