Once in a Blue Moon - Part Three

This is the 3rd part of the blog about making the "Once in a Blue Moon" quilt with battery operated LED lights.

I made pouches for the battery packs by quilting some of the blue sky material then sewing it up into a little bag open at the top and with a little strap.  I left extra so that I could stitch these bags onto something that would be on the back of the quilt; perhaps even the back itself.

Then I cut the backing into 2 pieces and hemmed each overlapping edge.  I positioned these to overlap at the point where I wanted the electric wires to come out of the back and into the pouches.  A small slit was made in the batting to get the wires through to the back as well.

 Slow and steady with fingers crossed, while carefully looking at the silver hand stitches,  I quilted the piece, making sure not to sew over the top of the wires.  The battery packs got in the way a little bit, but no enough to make it impossible to quilt the piece.  I'm glad I have a sit down quilting machine so that it enabled me to maneuver the battery packs.

Staying away from the wires

Maneuvering the battery packs

Close up of quilting 

I wanted to be able to turn the lights on and off from the bottom of the quilt and that's why I ran the lights towards the bottom.  They didn't quite reach, though, because there was only 19" from the last light to the battery box.  In hindsight, I should have put the boxes at the top of the quilt, and run the wires upwards instead of downwards.  This would have made the mounting of the boxes much easier.  However, it would have required a ladder to get the lights turned on and off once the quilt was hung at the quilt show.