Finishing up my Project Quilting Entry

This is the wrap up to my Project Quilting Making Music Challenge piece...if you are not familiar with Project Quilting, check it out at Kim's Crafty Apple blog.

After getting the elements fused and sewn to the field of the quilt, I chose this outer border...This is actually the reverse side of the fabric, the front side has LOTS of gold on it and I found it way too distracting for my quilt.

Then it was on to layering the quilt top, the batt and the backing together and start quilting! I chose to outline the heart and hands and do a radiating design from the heart to the red border. I put a freehand swirl in the outer border.

 This is the back of the quilt to give you an idea of the quilting design...Yes, it has some coffee stains on it!

To get my lines to be straight and somewhat evenly spaced, I used a piece of thread pinned to the center of the heart. I measured specific spots on the red border and lined the thread up to give me a guideline of where to quilt.

After quilting, blocking and trimming the quilt, it was time for binding. I chose to do a binding of the same color as the last border, but with a flange of red to tie it to the center of the quilt (plus the batik just looked boring when used as the binding up against the border). This requires cutting two narrow binding strips, the flange strip being 1/4" wider than the binding color. Sew them together and stitch them to the back of the quilt with the flange color UP (as shown above). Attach binding, flip to the front and stitch in the ditch between the binding and flange and you are done!

And a detail shot of the hands, with a hint of the binding  at the bottom:)

My second challenge has been met! I have named the quilt "Melody of Love"

Now back to work on the house...