256 HST's

I finished quilting the baby quilt for the church closet. the next one I make with HST's will have larger pieces.  I quilted this in the ditch and to me it looks like there is too much quilting. I  am also not too happy with the quilting in the borders.  Maybe it was too few pins or the poly batting but it starts out nice and flat at the beginning of each side but it is rippled after about the center. I am not going to fix anything because this is not going to hang on a wall and will probably end up on the floor or in a playpen and no doubt it will be washed often.
When I decided on the border and backing fabric I found that I had cut out a small chunk of it for something and I would have to do some piecing to stretch the backing. That's what happens when you have something for a long time and after every audition you put it back on the shelf; eventually you cut a piece of it for something. Very soon after doing that you will decide it just the thing you need and it WONT be enough. These two shots show the backing . I found another fabric that I had for awhile and had auditioned many times but never used and though they were from different designers and bought several years apart I think they are a perfect fit.

These two shots above show the front and back of the binding. (I still need to clean up the stray shreds of thread  which are hard to see sometimes but they sure show up in a photo close up).
I really have a hard time doing a lot of hand stitching anymore so I do my binding completely on the machine. I used to stitch it to the back and turn it to the front and finish with the machine on the front. Recently I started to stitch the binding to the front and then press it toward the binding and turn it over and press the  binding down and use 1/4 inch stitch witchery to hold it in place. I finish it from the front by stitching in the ditch along the edge of the binding or on children's quilts or something whimsical I use the #4 stitch on the Bernina, as I did here.

Front                            Back               

These photos on the right are showing the front and back of a corner of the binding, stitched in the ditch, on the T shirt quilt. I finished it on Sunday and I will post a photo soon, after I have given it to the recipient.

I guess that when I shop I tend to get what I came to get and don't look around. That is probably because Jack is usually waiting in the car for me.
I had no idea that stitch witchery came in 1/4 inch width until I ran out of the 1/2 inch and had to buy some more. I had been cutting the width in half; before that I was using strips of Wonder Under cut 1/4 inch wide. I got the whole idea from something Melody Johnson said on her blog and something Mari from The Quilting Edge wrote (probably from someone else too). Someone was using glue to hold the binding down until  it was stitched but I hate getting glue on my fingers and then sticking to everything. I think this works pretty well and it is so much easier for me than using pins. It works better on fabric that is not black or navy blue or dark brown.