I am about to embark on my first wholecloth quilt. It's going to be hand-sewn, traditional Welsh quilting. It'll be slightly unconventional in that the front will be a semi-plain, a sort of gently marbled/sponged marigold yellow fabric, and the back will be a flannel patterned with the world's cutest owls. The picture attached shows the two fabrics, and the strip at the bottom was just me experimenting with possible binding fabrics, if I end up going for a binding rather than a knife edge. I've also attached a sketch of the planned quilting pattern. The overall size will be 36" x 52".
Question #1: I'll be using perle #8 and big stitch quilting (told you it was going to be a bit unconventional), and of my very small thread stash so far, you can see a ball of bright pink thread that looks quite nice in the photo, the thread on the right. I only have one small ball of that, and I'm going to be switching to a different brand of thread so that I can buy as much as I need. It will either be Rubi
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...tchlink:top:en or Venus
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...tchlink:top:en though the Rubi is cheaper and sounds nicer. Any opinions on which colours will work best? I want a medium tone, strong enough to stand out nicely but not too screamingly contrasting, and either orange or pink. At the moment I'm leaning towards the Saffron Orange 4474 in the Rubi.
Question #2: how much thread am I likely to use, bearing in mind that this will be hand-sewn? I've done Welsh quilting before, I've done big stitch quilting with perle #8 before, I've just never put the two together and then used a single thread throughout.