Quilted!  The Selvage Quilt is Quilted!

Yesterday, I purchased thread, wound bobbins and got ready for a day of quilting.  I had decided on the quilting design, except for the borders.  I had an idea for the border and that idea worked.  And it lead to the rest of the border plan.  I am very happy to say that today, I quilted the Selvage Quilt! 

Bound and determined to utilize materials in my house, I've been carefully choosing batting for each project.  I've gone through many, many pieces.  I went searching for the perfect sized pieced for this quilt.  I found pieces that were too small and pieces that were better sized for a larger quilt.  I pulled out a bag with batting and found this piece.  It was a good size, by geez, was it thick!

3/4" thick!  Like I said, I was committed to using up stuff that had been sitting around and this piece was a good size for this quilt, so I layered and pin basted it.  While doing so, I caught a glimpse of this batting's prior life. 

I see old stitching lines!  Thinking about how thick this batting is, I think I figured this out.  This batting must have been salvaged from an old comforter!  It makes sense - it is thick and has old sewing lines (sorry, I can't bring myself to call them quilting lines).  Hmmmm, how much trouble is this comforter weight batting going to cause me?  Well, I was about to find out! 

I had just finished some part of the quilt and laid it on the floor in the media room.  The media room is just outside my quilt room and has just enough floor area to display a quilt (that is, as long as you don't want to walk around it).  Just then, the dinner call was made.  I went downstairs and enjoyed leftover lasagna for dinner.  Coming back up the stairs, I was greeted with this view:

It reminded me of that THICK batting.  I will admit that the back has some folds.  I don't normally have tucks or folds in my backing.  I am reasonably certain that this is due to that thick batting.  I decided to leave it as is and not to rip out and re-do.  This is partial because I intend on keeping this quilt for myself (at least until someone claims it) and mostly because I think I'll fight this problem throughout the quilt given the fact that it has a 3/4" batting.

I spent most of the day today quilting this quilt.  I'd bet that it would have taken significantly less time with a long arm.  And I bet it would look nicer.  I can't stitch a 9" curve on my machine without stopping and adjusting my hands.  When I do that, I don't get a smooth curve.  I'd love to be able to quilt a few quilts on a long arm just to see if my theories are true!

I decided to quilt the triple swirls in the X's.  I liked the was this work out.  When you look at this quilt, you see the selvage diamonds.  The triple swirls tied the areas between them together in an X shape.  I had to modify my plan for the selvages a bit.  I had thought about a few things, but decided on a wavy line following the selvages.  That was too fussy for the thick batt.  I ended up with something between a large meander and a wavy line.  And the border?  I just quilted it like the rest of the quilt!  I brought out the quilting as if there were selvages on those blocks.  The border quilting turned out fine, and I was able to baste the edge as I quilted the border. 

 Tomorrow should be the binding.  I'm thinking about a polka dot fabric to draw from the selvages.  I was concerned about getting that sewn onto the quilt with that thick batt, however, I feel a lot better about it since I've quilted the border.  I like to machine sew my bindings to the quilt, then hand sew them to the back.  If all goes well, I'll have a nice project to keep my lap warm an my hands busy during the Super Bowl tomorrow!