A Warm Welcome is done!

Here it is...all finished. Quilted and bound! Whew. For a little quilt at 24" square, it sure was a challenge! but it's good to have a challenge now and then.

I hope you can see the quilting if you are able to zoom in on the picture. It is not perfect, but I am learning new things on my quilting machine each time I quilt another quilt. If you have ideas of something else I could have quilted into the border area, I would love to hear about them. I was stumped and all I could think of was feathers...
VOTE FOR THIS QUILT HERE FOR THE SCRAP QUILT CATEGORY IN THE 5th BLOGGERS FESTIVAL!!

This is the backside. Again, not perfect, but if I squint, it looks good! LOL. I may consider no sleeve on this one for displaying both sides.

If you notice, I finished the back side the same as the front for the binding. Since I was using the english paper piecing method, I wanted to bind it as I have seen antique quilts bound with this shape. It was difficult at first, but ended up getting easier as I went around.
I started by sewing on a matching color paper piece (thanks to Mary Helen for that color suggestion). I stitched two sides of the piece. This pic below is from my phone, so it is a bit blurry, but I think you can see the new paper piece I am stitching on to the border. 

Then after an entire side of pieces were sewn on, I flipped them to the backside of the quilt.

The backing fabric was trimmed and folded under so that no raw edges showed at the intersection area that is very narrow. (See that right under my thumb.) Then I pinned the piece in place at the point and the narrow intersection where both sides are touching.

The edges were stitched in place as shown above and I took an extra stitch at the narrow area as seen below.

I used wool batting and it was quite puffy until I gave it a good steamy press. Now that it is completed, I think I like the look. It's a different way to bind and I do have great appreciation for our grandmothers of the past who used this method to finish their quilts. This was a common way to finish a Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt. Many times they would just fold the backing under instead of adding the colored piece like I did.
This quilt will hang in the Des Moines show the first weekend in October. I just got started on another quilt for the show! Yes, I am doing this at the last minute, but I do this every year to myself! I have posted Charmed Beginnings that I designed as a pattern for Blackberry Primitives. It looks quite different in cotton fabric this time around! The stems and grass are wool.

Now I am trying to decide on the border color...have to think on it for a while. Not too long though! It needs to be completed by Sept 21st!!
Thanks for stopping by today, take care,
Missie

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