I'm so glad you showed it to your husband, the recipient, for his opinion. I wanted to surprise my husband with a quilt of his favorite things and had seen a "row" quilt that I thought would be just perfect for the material and appliques I'd picked out. He hated it. He loved the blocks, but he hated the row layout. I ended up "framing" the blocks with two layers of "logs" plus sashing. He showed that quilt to everyone who came in the house. It was worth the work to make it what he liked.