Chalk up another finish !

Phewwwwwww.........every one of these I do makes me wonder if it will be the last !

Basting this quilt, at 72 x 90 inches, was such a chore, I was aching in my back by the time I finished.
But then, wrestling it through the small opening of my old Singer machine was a real tug of war !

I started out by using the walking foot, outlining all major seams.   I thought that that was all that I was going to do.  But realizing that this batting is cotton and was going to shrink up in the dryer, I knew that the big unquilted portions of each block were going to be unsightly.  So, dreading it, but knowing that I somehow had to make it work, I went back in with the darning foot.

I HAVE to find a new walking foot !   This one pushed the top along, making a little tuck when I would come upon another seam crossing my way !   I was very frustrated by that, I don't mind telling you.  I would have bought a new foot long ago, but I can't find one to fit my old Singer, and still has a wide area at the needle hole so that I can see where I'm stitching.  This one gives you almost a blind view.  
















 I free-motion-quilted loop-de-loops in both sides of the blocks, leaving the 1 1/2 inch strip unquilted except for the ditch-quilting that they had already received.

 
I had to figure out paths for the quilting to take as I traveled from one section of a block to the next.  Most of the quilt is connected that way, continuously, but I did wind up with a couple of sections that I had to do on their own.

At one point, the thread broke, and I found that I had been quilting with the presser foot up..........yikes, there were loops everywhere on the back.  Well, it seemed like it at the time, but in reality, it was probably just part of one block.  But before I had done that, the tension had gotten skewed by the quilt rubbing against the dial somehow, and there was a bunch more quilting that had small loops all along the back of it.   So, I had to sit down and remove quite a bit of stitching, and then go in and redo it.  Blessedly, all was good after that, and in pretty good time, I got it all done to my satisfaction. 

I actually quilted the outer border before I went back and quilted the loopies in the blocks. I did a meandering pattern in the last border, and a wiggly/squiggly line in the dark blue border.   I even bound the two long, side edges before I realized that I had to do more quilting within the quilt itself.   The binding is the same fabric as the back.

It's not a coordinate of the other fabrics in the top, which are a collection called, "Mastermind" by Jennifer Callo for Connecting Threads, it but goes well with it.  On the other hand, I had planned to bind it in the dark blue that I used for the next-to-last border, but when I placed it against the backing fabric, it looked terrible from the back.  So, I switched to the backing fabric for binding.

The quilt has been through the washer and dryer, and I actually liked it better before that.    I still need to stitch a label onto the back, and then figure out how I'm going to get it to my 3-year-old grandson in Oklahoma..........no hurry, as he still sleeps on a crib-sized mattress in a little boy bed.

EDIT:  Just adding my wishlist from Connecting Threads in order to be added to their 'wishlist giveaway' sweepstakes.