Here we go!

The quilt top is finished, I've sewn my last stitch joining all my hexies together. As I did, I was quite nostalgic and slightly sad about not handling my little guys again.
But onwards to the next stage!
(is it like a quilting right of passage, I now have a near adolescent school going quilt waiting for it's final additions and then out into the world eventually!)
I got up bright & early around 8 on a saturday and gave the whole top a good iron, right side up so I didn't need to faff with the tons of back edges. I'd promised myself and husband that I'd only take the threads out of a couple to see how it looks, we had quite alot to do in the house yesterday & I was still in my dressing gown. 10 o'clock passed, so did 11 & I was still picking all the threads and making a great mess in the living room at the same time. I finished at 12 and all the papers were starting to fall out anyway, surely that won't take long... It was nearly TWO when I dragged myself to the shower ;)
Once you get started with removing the threads and papers it's quite therapeutic & you soon get into the swing of it. I kept the paper and threads in all the edge hexies, hopefully giving it a bit more stability and strength when I handle, baste and quilt it. As I'll be doing a hexie edge anyway, I won't need to take them out for a while.
I was in love! It looks so clean without all the basting threads.





But the back looked quite good too











That's alot of hexies! (820 or round about)

So I left it sitting patiently on my coffee table while I got on with my jobs at long last ;)
To be continued...
(I did put my quilt sammich together today, but will do a new post for that stage to save this one getting huge)