The quilt is basted together in its sandwich state ready for quilting. I decided to sew in the ditch around all the applique and around the borders. This would set all the pieces nicely and stablize the sandwich.

Frist thing I did was audition the thread I was going to use. Yes it is another tryout to get the color right. I continue along my motto of using only what was in my stash. That was not too tough since when it comes to thread I have accumulated a bunch over the last 40 years. Here is a picture of it so you can see I have lots of choices.

Pulled all the brown or grey threads and set them on the background to see which is the most invisible. You can check it out with this small slide show of the audition.

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When quilting the sandwich together one should start in the center and work outwards. I stated with the branches going outward. This insures that there are limited bubbles or bunched fabric. Once I got the branches done, I moved into leaves and twigs. I saved the little crying baby crow for last.

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The next step is to sewing around the borders to make them nice and secure. After that I pulled the white basting thread out. No need for it now.

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And here is the finished piece. See how it got kind of puffy and gained depth to it. Next step will be to do the squiggly quilting on the sky background that is called stippling.

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