Tied up in knots!

It seems like an age since I had a finish to report, and not just a finish but a finished quilt! Having a deadline tends to concentrate a girl's mind :)

December 1st was the deadline for handing over the quilts being made by the group I joined when we moved. At the time of joining I blogged that meeting the deadline with one and maybe two completed quilts would be a breeze! Ha! I should have known better.

Only one of the prospective quilts was finished in time. I really have no excuse for that as the second top has been gathering dust in my sewing room since September! I dithered so much about what backing to use and how to quilt it that neither of those things happened.

On the bright side "Fit to be Tied" is completed and handed over, so one wheelchair bound child will have a bit of colourful comfort this winter.

As I mentioned before I Tie Quilted this, which was a first for me and I am really happy with how it turned out. I added a drop of Fray Check to each knot as I was worried about the thread fraying and unravelling. It made the knots stiff so I decided to wash and dry the quilt in the hope that it would take out that stiffness, which fortunately it did. I am not so sure that I would use the tie quilting method on a large quilt but it worked just fine for this lap quilt size. I think the quilting also lends itself more to traditional, block pattern quilts too, although perhaps I just need to experiment with that more :)

For extra warmth, and part of the reason for tie quilting, I used a wool check fabric for the quilt back. I was a bit anxious when the quilt was in the dryer but it all came out looking fine.

For the binding I used the Square Corner Binding method outlined by Carolyn Forster in her book "Sew Jelly Roll Quilts and Gifts" . It was a neater finish than I sometimes achieve with mitred corners, but if I am honest I prefer the look of a (neat!) mitred corner.

 So, that's my first Friday finish in December, let's hope it is a good omen :)

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts