I'd keep your first quilt easier to do -- for batting, use a layer or two of flannel or a lightweight fleece, so you don't have to quilt every couple of inches. The quilt will hold up better that way, even with lots of washing, etc. Doing ties is perfectly ok, especially if you used embroidery thread...tie square knots, which you can google to get directions for as its really easy. You could even choose some interesting buttons to put in each corner of the the blocks and use embroidery thread to thread through and tie your knots on top of each button. But if you're going to give this quilt to a child or baby, the ties must be VERY short (1/2" or less), and no buttons, for safety reasons. You could do stitch in the ditch or even echo quilting (1/4" away from each seam) or big "X"s in each block. Do a small 'test' quilt (with smaller blocks, maybe 10-12" big) first to see if you find you hate something right after starting it, rather than learning on your quilt. Have fun with it as its a fun quilt -- you did a great job!