Val, what kind of mulch do you mean? Many things can be used as mulch, some would not be desirable for the medium one plants everything into, for instance hunks of pine bark. Shredded leaves are a mulch I use, but I don't imagine one can buy that. As for putting a layer of peat ON TOP of your beds, I would tell Lilacs and everyone else reading this to not do that under any circumstance! I don't know how it is pre-moistened when you buy it, but I have heard from gardening friends and read numerous times on gardenweb how peat dries out and forms a layer through which water does not penetrate. That is the last thing you would want on top of your garden bed. Peat, if used at all, must be mixed in with other material. After another growing season, hopefully we have told Lilacs enough times that she will be adding to the raised bed after her harvest with leaves, coffee grounds, grass clippings, manure, whatever. By the way, I got two bales of straw free during my late fall gathering of other people's leaves venture. People buy them for decoration and then throw them away after Halloween and Thanksgiving. I live in the country, but I scrounge in a nearby subdivision in a neighboring city. Marcia

Finchlover, the only reason for not quilting in the ditch is that you won't be able to see your quilting stitches. If you're quilting with a machine it doesn't matter because they will all be the same size anyway. If you quilt by hand and have beautiful, neat, even, tiny quilting stitches, you wouldn't do them justice by hiding them in the ditch. You'd want to show them off by stitching a fancy pattern on the face of the quilt. I've been quilting for about 36 years, not sure how many I've made during that time, maybe 35 or 40. Some larger some smaller, some machine pieced and hand quilted, some all handmade. Made a few embroidered tops and hand quilted. I've only made one quilt that was machine quilted and I did quilt in the ditch. I made it about 20 years ago and I'm still using it. Made a few whole cloth quilts, small ones for babies, pink, yellow, blue, lavender, that had tons of quilting on them. I use a lap hoop to do the quilting and generally hand piece the tops. Haven't done an applique top in a long time, but I've been thinking about a cute butterfly pattern I saw recently on e-Bay I'd like to try. I confess I have several tops that need to be quilted, but since I use a lap hoop, I really do need cold weather to do them. My current project is a yo-yo quilt, which isn't really a quilt at all, but it takes a real long time to make and uses a lot of different fabrics and requires a lot of hand sewing. I just finished cutting out 4000 2" squares for a postage stamp quilt and I have a sack of 2" x 45" strips to piece together and cut out a four pointed star quilt top. Lastly, I'm still in the gathering stage of a silk quilt using men's silk neck ties. I have collected about 50 ties, taken out the stitching and facings and have the fabric neatly waiting until I have enough to start piecing. I figure for a nice sized quilt that's suitable for display I'll need about 250 ties. Using all the silk, I'll stabilize it with fusable interfacing, join the bits into thirty 12" squares, Then sew the squares together. The best part of the silk crazy quilt is the embroidery on each seam embellishing it and giving it character and charm. I made a small one (45" X 56")for my mom years ago and it was so much fun. If you find that you love quilting, you'll be hooked for life. In 1976 I was in the Navy and had a mid watch at the women's barracks. When I walked into the watch office the woman on duty was piecing a postage stamp quilt. She had a grocery sack full of tiny squares and several completed blocks. It hit me like a cold shower. When I got off watch the next morning I went home and cut up a bunch of old clothes, some tablecloths, several of my husband's shirts (he was overseas at the time) and I started quilting that day. Since then I've never lost the bug. I agree with bellaroma you should take a beginners class. It's better than teaching yourself and making all the mistakes that will cost you time and money and could ruin your drive to continue quilting. Learn the basics first. Cheryl P.S. I just scored a major stash of quilting fabrics at an estate sale. I got about 50 yards of various cotton quilting fabrics for $6. The lady was a quilter and had her stash separated into color groups, so I just scooped them out of her handy bins and into my shopping sack. Lord rest her dear soul, she had the biggest stash I've ever seen so I guess she was the winner.

Another thought.... How long do you want it to hang down on each side? How high is the queen bed it's going on? The difference in width on the beautiful quilt you're getting is 15". That means it would hang only 7.5" longer on each side of the bed. A queen mattress is 60" wide. The king quilt is 101" wide. That means it would hang down 20.5" on each side of the bed. (101 - 60 = 41, which is 20.5" on each side.) The full/queen is going to hang down 13" on each side of your queen bed. If you have a high bed, you might want to take a tape measure and try the 2 'side hang' measurements above on your bed before choosing. (Can you tell that my work is in analysis???) âº

I took a close look at our "summer" spread. It's a Peacock Alley quilted print,in a light shade.....no pulls. It's polished cotton with a sheen. Tightly woven cotton must be the answer as our old( gave to DD...dang!)quilt was cotton and no, or few pulls. I, too, am no longer a fan of duvets, and really dislike those very heavy comforters, which are everywhere. Quilts(solid) are harder to come by, and often are "silk".I keep a down on he bottom to pull up when needed. So, to sorta hijack my own post, any good sources for cotton quilts( small stitches kind vs big squares or whatnot) ? caroloh, I love the velvet. Good to hear it's sturdy...hope it's not heavy. I'll go see if they still have them. Thanks. Allison, you mentioned 'other beds'. Are the dogs on those, too? How do those linens hold up? Ah the joys of pups:>) Our familyroom sofa is dressed in a quilt daily as it's her "day bed" :>) Okay, handy for the grandkids, too.