Vanquishing needle holes...

... I think.

At long last, the edges of the quilt are finished the remaining squares are sewn into place.  The process of sewing, however, left a glittery effect when the quilt was held up to the light.  I had tried different sized needles in the machine, but smaller ones simply shredded the threads, making sewing impossible.  I did reach a happy compromise with needle sizes and threads in the end (this is a learning quilt), but was still left with a galaxy of holes, especially near the center of the quilt.

After much searching online for solutions, and reading interesting advice, such as "use only cotton fabrics" (which I don't), I settled for soaking the quilt in warm water in my washing machine, spinning it out after half an hour, and drying it in the dryer for 20 minutes.  The theory behind that method is that the warm water will swell the cotton threads, as does the heat of the dryer before the water evaporates, thus returning the fabric to its pre-sewn state of no holes (other than the now tight fitting hole around the thread).

My sewing held up to the soaking, spinning and drying, and the frequency of glittery holes is now much smaller than it was,.  The holes that are left are few, far between, and much smaller than when they started out.



On to the next step - creating a focal point!

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