Nursie 76 - well done with your child's quilt, it's perfect.
EightyLady - as you may know, hand quilting threads are 100% cotton and much thicker than machine weights - Coats and Gutermann sell hand quilting threads in Oz but I haven't needed a variegated one so not sure if there are any. Thinking of all the twisting and twining of several colours that goes into in making variegated thread I doubt there would be one strong enough for hand use.