I'm also a mbr of the no-work or less-work club, too many of us by the long list of posts:(:( Unfortunately, my employer was ME! - had to close my quilt shop before the economy got any worse. So many of my customers or their husbands had lost their job or had hrs cut & they were working off their stash & not buying fabric. I'm not complaining, I could understand. I had already survived a fire & a 100-yr flood --- the troubling economy was the last straw, besides, who knew how long it would last (STILL!!?!! Hang in there - there are blessings to enjoy! More time for the fun things & the people in your life top the list. Let's all keep the faith & keep praying for an economical turn-around!

Great colors, Amy! Neat idea to use the decorative stitch with varigated thread for quilting, too. I understand your comment about the Crazy 8 looking too random as you put it together. I felt the same way about Turning Twenty and the Wickedly Easy patterns. I did a controlled scrappy with the Wickedly Easy tractor one I did and like that much better. SharonG/FL

I tried pressing after washing then found out just folding selvage to salvage and kinda pressing with my hands worked just as well. I have noticed that the flannel stretches alot more when washed am thinking thats because I washed the sizing out. Last time I was at my LQS they have some nice Rag quilts and they didn,t wash first they did tell me to use a small stitch around the edge it helps with the raveling. The fabric coming this week is in 5yd pieces I really don,t want to try washing that. I,m learning as I go found out when I start washing the finished quilt I just run it through the rinse cycle twice without drying then run them through a complete cycle a couple of times drying in between I use no soap in the washer. Gillian.

I just abut...and doing a big, hand whip stitch, sew the pieces together...I do it all the time and it's totally unnoticeable. I don't worry about it staying in place....that's one of the things the quilting does...keeps everything where it's suppose to be. I keep a container of left over batting pieces, and I'm always having to haul it out and find a piece the right size. I don't always do it at the beginning of the sandwich making process. As the piece will go on the edge, I often wait till my quilting progresses to the edge, before adding the necessary piece...after quilting a lot of the quilt, the needed size often changes. Plus, I'm doing it all by hand, so don't have the 'taking it out of the machine and having to put it back' problem