A Quilt for My Hubby I *lovingly* Sewed

My husband loves denim and flannel, and has the closet to prove it. So I convinced him I'd make him a wonderful quilt out of his two favorite fabrics if he'd just give me a couple of his extra large flannel shirts.

I'm pleased to say he did, and now he has a great quilt and someday one of our kids will enjoy it also!

However, this project did not get pulled off without great "beginner quilting escapades". Although I am not new to sewing, I am new to quilting.

I admit to blurting out a couple of swear words…and breaking a few needles….and thread breaking…and threatening to not finish the project. Finally I stepped away, took some nice, deep breaths and headed to the local quilting store, where I explained my project to a worker, who assumed I was not using batting. Um…yes. I am using batting in-between the denim and the heavy flannel backing. In fact, it was spray-basted to both the quilt top and the quilt bottom. She kindly responded "Well, it sure will be warm on a very cold night." Problem is I hate being cold and we don't camp, and our power bill is always on time, so I figured I'd better remove the batting.

How fun to remove all the stitching on this quilt. (sarcasm, anyone?) It was messy. Sticky. Frustrating. But I did it. Since everything had already been trimmed and ready for binding before disassembling it, I thought I would forgo the binding and just rag the edges. It came out very nicely…finally. And it's not stiff as a board and only useful in the Arctic Circle. The key was to clean out my machine of all the lint that was in there from the rag quilt I made previously, having the right denim machine needles and a bigger stitch. I stitched in the ditch around all the squares (twice, mind you).