I'm generally pleased with how it turned out. It's not perfect, but as I kept telling myself while I was working on it, "It's okay, it's for cats." I learned that I have a really hard time quilting a star shape unless I start in the bottom left-hand corner. If I tried to start from any other position they turned out really wonky. I also learned that it's difficult for me to quilt a more open pattern. I had planned to try to not have the quilting as close together as I had in my previous free-motion quilting endeavors, but it turned out about the same. I think it may have something to do with having such a small area to work in, since I'm using my regular home sewing machine to quilt it.
I also machine attached the binding, which I don't normally do. I usually attach the binding to the front on the quilt with the machine and then turn it to the back by hand. But again, since it was for the cats, I decided to do it with the machine. I watched a tutorial on YouTube from the Fat Quarter Shop on how to machine bind your quilt and generally followed their directions (I trimmed mine even with the edge of the quilt top and didn't leave the extra quarter inch or however much they said). It turned out okay. The stitching only missed the binding in one small spot near one of the corners, but I really can't imagine using that technique again. I felt like I was sewing a porcupine instead of a quilt with all those pins sticking out all around the outside edge of the quilt. Ouch! Literally. I stuck myself many times. (Watch the tutorial and you'll understand.)
But now it is finished and Cleopatra seems to be enjoying it. Dusty, my other cat, is still leery of it, but he's a totally scaredy cat about everything. Clearly a quilt in box is some type of trap. I mean, what else could it be, right?
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