Thanks all! This quilt went out in the mail this morning....was a little hard to let it go! Lol. The pattern is also available to purchase online, I believe....I am already working on another pattern from the book tho! And, yes, background fabric is solid white Kona cotton. I hand washed the batiks prior to cutting...had to discard the first dark blue binding fabric-after 2 days of soaking and washing, it was still bleeding! I washed the completed quilt a few times without color catchers and held my breath! The recipient is a cancer survivor and she is careful about exposures, so I didn't want to use any sort of chemicals. Whew. Thanks again for such nice comments-they mean a lot coming from such a talented group!