Folksy "Come Dance" Quilt Finally Finished

For those of you following my quilt story you remember that my son asked me to make him this huge 90" square (give or take an ") quilt for dancing on at folk festivals he and his family attend in the summer time. Today I put the finishing touches on it. Poor Henry is going to miss this big blanket when it finally goes into the mail. But here he enjoys it with its border and binding sewn on...The binding is all in velvet from my stash. I just realized that my son requested this quilt on May 15th, I came home and started it on 18th, and I finished it on May 28th 11 days later! Wow, I made it in less than two weeks! Now that IS impressive if I do say so myself.

(Most photos will enlarge when clicked on) I even embroidered one section for the dance theme... and I used my free motion sewing to write across the top border: "Come Dance * Dan *

* Dan * Jackie *

* And then a baby face for yet unnamed baby expected in August this summer *

* Mikiah *

my just turned 21 yr old grand son, my son's eldest child * Kaeli *

My son's teen aged daughter, my second grand child

I added free motion swirls across the other three sides, which can best be seen

on the reverse side...they added quilting to the border but are green thread on

green fabric on top; and green thread on orange nylon backing.

The dots on the orange middle are the back side of the tied knots on top

quilting the middle section in this tied style.

Henry and I put it on the back lawn to practice dancing on it and it did not slip or slide

as I'd feared.

Here you can see the spiral design on the velvet border.

I machine sewed the binding on front and back to make it sturdy. Since it will be used a lot

I did not want to chance a neatly hand sewn binding on the back.

For something I had much trepidation about starting

due to it's size and weight (the upholstery samples are some very heavy, some light)

and moving it under my sewing machine turned out to be do able given

that I set up frames and chairs to old the bulk while running it under the machine.

Each seam is sewn at least three times for durability.

And the nylon seemed to do it's job as requested "water proof" by son;

as the grass was wet and it kept it from soaking through to the top as I sat on it.

I have washed it three times, twice just the top and finally the whole sandwiched quilt

and it dried for a while in the dryer on low heat/delicate until the nylon was dry;

then I air dried it over chairs until the rest was dry.

And it did not shrink!

I will not take on another so big a project anytime soon,

but I am very happy that I was able to fill my son's request by

accomplishing this one.

Now,

Let the Dancing begin!

I promise, this is the last you will see of this quilt, unless of course my son

sends photos of them dancing on it!

;-))