Christmas quilt--a day late

I finished my daughter's Christmas present this morning. I was going to have it quilted by a friend who has a big quilting machine because it is a big quilt and I just wasn't comfortable doing it myself. But, when I had to move Pierce, my quilting machine into the garage for the Christmas tree, I decided I had enough room to move around the table and really get to the quilt and I would just give it a try. The quilt barely fit on the frame as it was set up. I could have added one more bar and made the frame wider, but the thing already bows when you stretch it and I just didn't feel like working that hard. I quilted it in under an hour yesterday eventhough it was really cold :) Ok, it was about 60 with the sun shining, but that was cold for me. Then, I put the binding on this morning and it was done. I like the back as much as the front and she can flip it over if she wants to have a more sophisticated look to her room at college. It saved me about $100 to not have it done by someone else. I think that earns me $100 to spend at the quilt shop on more fabric, don't you think?

I decided that 2009 will be the year to get rid of my quilting fears. I was afraid to quilt this quilt because I didn't think I could do it and look, it is done and looks pretty good. My next biggest fear is half square triangles. I'm going to overcome that fear this coming year by practicing on them and trying out some new patterns. I got several quilting books for Christmas and I am going to give each one a chance to become a quilt, rather than sit on the shelf collecting dust.

I also spent the morning cutting binding strips so I can work on those quilts to reach my goal of 100 quilts for the year. Now that my daughter's is done, I only have 12 more to go.

And here is the picture of the finished Santa wall hanging. I gave it to my daughter's boyfriend's mom for Christmas.