Originally Posted by annlouise

Absolutely beautiful. I just love the restful, comfortable look of your top and that is a good idea for the back. I was wondering if you could just use a large solid piece for the main back and use the blocks as borders for the back, that way your SID or X from the front will have more attention and you will still be able to use all your scaps and more around the border of the back.

Originally Posted by karenm36

Well, thanks to everyone that encouraged me...my quilt top is done! :-) I took it to the LQS with a sheet that I was going to use as a backing and the 2 women there discouraged me from doing so for numerous reasons. This particular sheet may not have been in the best condition (though I thought it was fine) so I agreed with their assessment...BUT still do not want to have to purchase more material for the back as I'm on a very tight budget. They suggested I see if I could piece the back with all the scraps that I had left over from the top.

The scraps are from some yardage...but most are from shirts so I'm limited with the size that I can use. I opted on 10 inch finished squares as I could maximize the use of my material with that size. Well...suddenly I realized that this is becoming a reversible quilt! Unintentionally...but I think it's going to be okay. But now here's my dilemma...

1)How does one quilt the top (that's on point) when the back is going to be so different?

2) I have only quilted one other quilt before this and it was smaller and it was SID. I did fine with it but originally thought with this one I would stitch an "X" through each square (doing a kind of grid pattern) since I have only a regular sewing machine.
But now since there's a whole other thing going on the back...would it be better if I did something else? And if so, what would look good?

3) I do have my mother's sewing machine and I recently purchased a free motion/darning foot to use on it...but I haven't used it yet. Is this something I should consider? Not sure I'm ready for it...or even if I can handle so much quilt through my machine.

Would really love to hear from those of you who have just a basic sewing machine...how do you quilt your large quilts and what would you do in this case?

Thanks so much! Karen