Midnight Crossing - Naming and Completion

Naming a quilt, embroidering the labels, and stitching on the binding are my final steps to completing a quilt. But when it comes down to adding the label, I need to settle on a name, which can take a while. For convenience and consistency during my indecisiveness on selecting a more personal name for this quilt, I used the working title Midnight Crossing, the same as its source pattern. Some name considerations for the final title were:

•  CHEX (for checker boards and X's)
•  RR_X-ing (since the X's look like those crossed bars for trains),
•  X-TRA (why not?) 
•  ORANGE_IS_THE_NEW_BLACK (since it is sort of for Halloween). 
•  My husband suggested X_MARKS _THE _SPOT, which appealed, but I claimed it was too long.

My issue with length mellowed and so the chosen name became X_MARKS_THE _SPOT. Now I could machine embroider my labels and hand stitch them on diagonally. I secure them in place before I attach the binding. I was glad I had made the effort to fussy cut the binding so it lined up uniformly around the quilt. I also was pleased with the somewhat military precision of the piano key border. 

To document the completion of a quilt I have heard that a straight on photo of the front as well as some artfully draped poses are recommended. My artful draping is a bit awkward, but I tried to improve the poses by including some of my fall decor. There area few closeup up photos, but most of those are in previous posts. First, here are two outdoor photos.

Then indoors with some furniture draping.

Then some closer-in views showing the binding, labeling, backing, and table decor.

Often I am asked how long does it takes me to make a quilt? Since quilt-making is not a continuous process for me, that is hard to answer. But based on my blog posts of progress, this 68½" square quilt, X_MARKS_THE_SPOT, took me about two months from mid August to mid October. I still see a few FMQ glitches that I might fix, and I may add a bit more FMQ in the sixteen blocks, but I am claiming completion. Completing this quilt by Halloween was a 2022 goal of mine and I am claiming mission accomplished! I really enjoyed working on this one!

•   Start of the kit and first six blocks (08/18/22) 
•   Continuation with four more blocks (08/23/22)
•   Completion of last six blocks (08/27/22)
•   Making nine patch corner posts (08/29/22)
•   Inner sashings and central assembly (09/12/22)
•   Adding outer sashing and borders (09/16/22)
•   Fussy cutting binding and thread selection for FMQ (09/29/22)
•   Heart quilting in blocks (10/10/22)
•   FMQ in inner and outer borders (10/14/22)
•   Displayed for Third Saturday of October (10/15/22)
•   Naming, completion and final photography (10/18/22 - this post)