Of course you were right, commenter, A Maiden Hair Fern !

I washed the Heart Strings quilt today, and was blessed with a wonderfully , crinkly goodness, warm from the dryer.  There was definitely no disappointment.
















                                                                                                                                                     
     I updated it's 'before laundering' measurements in the stats of the former post to read 61 1/2 inches by 80 inches.
The 'after laundering' measurements are 59 by 76 1/2 inches.  I washed it in cold water, and dried it on a perma-press setting in my dryer.
So I lost 2 1/2 inches in the width, and 3 1/2 inches in the length.  Not too bad, but something that I should definitely factor into the finished size of the quilts that I am piecing.    60 x 80 is about my standard go-to size now, but I want ALL OF THAT, after shrinkage.

Still, this is my most favorite quilt that I have made in YEARS, and I find no fault with it.

Today, I basted another quilt, this time going back to doing it under the carport.   It took me most of 4 hours from beginning to end, but I basted it in a grid 4 inches apart widthwise and lengthwise.  I find that anything farther apart than this allows too much movement of the layers when quilting on my standard size, old model 15 Singer sewing machine.

Here are the legs to my basting frame, set in place (my husband made my legs for me, probably 30 or more years ago.)

  This photo shows me putting the top onto the pinned on backing that is topped by the batting.  The wind started to get up at this point (it was around 11 a.m.), and I  prayed for it to ease off.  AND IT DID.  Praise God, He cares about the little things that are important to us, as well as the big ones.

Here, the quilt layers are all ready .  At this point,  I use a fairly long straight needle to baste around the perimeter of the quilt layers, scooting my office chair underneath me as I go.  Then, using a curved needle, I stand and STRE-T-C-H to baste each row, reaching just to the center and basting toward me when I get to the middle rows of the quilt.  I do a back-stitch about every 9th stitch, incase the basting stitches get cut during the quilting.  That way the whole row doesn't come unbasted.

And here is a happily-tired baster/quilter with a fully-basted quilt.  I always wonder how much the 'sway' in the middle of the quilt affects how square the quilt will turn out, but thus far I haven't noticed any particular problems.  I've never had success trying to baste a quilt layed out flat on the floor.

I don't know who this quilt will be for.  I've already changed my mind twice, so I'll just concentrate on completing it, and I'm sure I'll know by then.

P.S. For Maggie, who calls herself a novice quilter, this is the entire basis for making the Heart Strings quilt....

I glued a one-inch strip of white diagonally on these 10-inch square papers from Missouri Star Quilt Company, and started sewing strips to each side of the white strip, and pressing them outwards.  When the paper was covered, I trimmed it to 9 1/2 inches. There are many possibilites for designs when laying out all the squares, but all of the squares are made the exact same way.  After putting the whole top together, I went back and removed the papers.