String Quilt Finished with Knife Edge Binding

Tada! Finally, my string quilt full size quilt is finished and I love it...and more importantly so does DS!Here's a close-up. I machine quilted loopty-loops in the red areas and on the sashing and straight line 1/4" outline style quilting on the strings.
All folded up and ready to go to its new home...DS's apartment!
Here's a close-up of the Knife Edge finish I used....I didn't want a black binding and I had no red fabric left so I decided to finish the quilt this way. Its a technique I learned from an unknown quilter...the quilter that made my vintage red and yellow tumbling blocks quilt and I thought I'd share with you how I did it.
Putting on this binding is like adding another border to a quilt...it is not a continuous binding.

I prepared my binding strips for the top and bottom of the quilt exactly the same way I would a border-only its a 1" border!

You can see the binding pinned onto the quilt...notice the pressed down edge-I pressed 1/4" of the long edge of the binding strip for ease when sewing it to the back.
Binding machine sewed on with a 1/4" seam.

I then pulled the entire binding to the back (including the seam allowance-the whole thing!) and pinned.
Here you can see how it looks from the front as I pulled the binding to the back and pinned. Once completely pinned, I sewed the top and bottom bindings to the back of the quilt by hand-the whole idea is that nothing shows on the front so you kind of have to sew the binding to the back by hand.

Now for the side bindings. They're almost exactly the same...the exception is that I cut them 1/2" longer than I would have if they really were a border for the quilt so I could fold under 1/4" of the short sides. This way there will be no raw edges when I finish the binding.
Next I pinned the side binding on....you can see that the top binding is completely finished and I've aligned the short folded edge of the new binding to the finished edge of the quilt.
View of side binding sewn on from the front of the quilt...
View of side binding sewn on from the back of the quilt. (See how I sewed over the finished binding.)
I then pulled the side bindings completely to the back, pinned and sewed by hand...and that's it-a machine sewn (well, mostly) knife edge finish!

While not my regular binding choice, I have used this on other quilts when it just seemed the perfect finish.

This is my second finish for the String Quilt Challenge and my first finish for the Spring to Finish Challenge 2010.

I'm also linking to Finished for Friday and Sew and Tell. Hop on over and see all the wonderful finishes!

Spring to Finish Challenge

I just heard about the Spring to Finish Challenge hosted by Jacquie at Tallgrass Prairie Studio...its just perfect for me! I've already gotten started on the 9-patch UFO blocks.

Here's my list of to-dos:

1. Finish quilting DS's String quilt (for the String Quilt Challenge!).

2. Finish the 9-patch quilt top and quilt it.

3. Quilt another quilt top that's in my closet (not sure yet which one but I'm thinking either another little string baby quilt or the black, white and red log cabin I did for the Black and White Challenge ).

I like this...use this challenge to finish up the fun projects from earlier challenges....would you say I need the encouragement of challenges?

If you do too, just use the link above...its not to late to join!

And to show how badly I need this boost, here's a photo of what I've quilted on DS's quilt so far...One long diagonal row. and now I'm not sure that DS will like the red quilting on the black sashes...it was just so much easier to just keep going down the row with the same quilting! :) He's coming this week-end so I'll found out soon enough (hmm, maybe I'd better work on another project til then.)

It was very hard to take a picture...the quilting only showed up in this close-up. You can see the whole quilt top her

String Quilt Surprise

Remember these? I couldn't decide which setting I liked best and judging by your comments, neither could alot of you. Well, I decided to let my son decide, since it will be his quilt. Which did he choose? He looked and looked and he couldn't decide either. Then he said, "Wait a minute.

What if we turn this one like this, and this one like this..."

And there you have it! Straight furrows! I hadn't even thought of this setting. Mind you, this is the child who grew up with a quilting Mom-seems something rubbed off!

One of things I like about this string quilt block is that you can use it with any log cabin/half square triangle setting...you just have to remember them all!

The top is all sewn together-great to get back into the sewing room-now it just needs to be quilted. I'm hoping to baste it up this week and get started.

Thanks everyone for your help!

String Quilt Possibilities

I've laid out some of the string blocks for DS's quilt on the guest bed...I love the black sashing and red cornerstones-I'm just not sure yet about the block arrangement. Here are three possibilities. This is interesting because of all the movement behind the sashing.

This is kind of dramatic.

What do you think?

Sunlight and Shadow quilt: String quilt style

I've been fooling around with this Sunshine and Shadow block for a while now. Here,
and here. Both of these are foundation pieced with equal width strips...
but now I'm doing them String pieced! Oh how liberating....how quick and easy...and a great way to use up scraps-lots and lots of scraps! Finally!

Remember what my ironing board looked like last week...well, this is it today. 42 blocks-all sewn with just some trimming left to do!
I love this! I love this so much I have joined Stephanie String Quilt Challenge so this will be just the first String quilt this year! Yes!

To see what other String Quilt- bitten- by- the- bug quilters are up to check out the list on Loft Creations side bar ( visit anytime using the button on my sidebar :).

Here's a quick peak at three finished, trimmed blocks!
The start of a fun, fun scrap quilt!