Fanciful Binding

One of the things I love best about the Internet is the plethora of ideas freely shared and available for use to better our lives. Sure, some of it should be taken with a grain (or pound) of salt, but most of the time I find really cool stuff.

One day last month a neat binding idea happened into my line of sight...one of the many Internet habitrails I followed led me to the tip, probably in a quilting Facebook group. I've backtracked several lists and blogs trying to give credit and thanks, to no avail. So, if you did this first...thanks.

I cut 10 binding strips from each of the Blueberry dot (from Pat Sloan's Eat Your Fruits and Veggies line for Moda fabrics), and the yellow Kona. I cut the blue 2.25" wide and the yellow 1.625" wide. I actually did three different test pieces before I decided on those widths to yield the look I wanted. I seamed the WOF strips into one long strip, then pieced the blue and yellow together. I was actually proud of myself for thinking about staggering the seams in the blue and yellow to reduce bulk. I did that by cutting one of the yellow strips in half, and placing a short strip first in the assembly line of yellow binding.

I pressed the entire strip toward the blue, and then in half, wrong sides together.

Here you can see my staggered seams:

As I press binding, I like to roll it up on a paper towel tube to keep it neat until I'm ready to stitch. You can see the blueberry "piping" that will show on the front of my quilt.

I sewed it onto the back of my quilt (I used white Cairo cotton thread in both top and bobbin to attach), making nice miters at the corners.

Then I topstitched it on the front of my quilt right in the seam between the blue and yellow. I deliberately pulled a wider binding to the front, and changed my top thread to yellow for camouflage.

I love the accent color!

And I'm happy with the extra line of stitching on the back.

It's such a good feeling to finish a quilt! All it needs is a label and some sunshine for a good picture.