I machine stitch the front & then to hand sew the back of baby quilts takes me 4-5 hours to complete doing 3/16-1/4" blind stitches.
Sorry to hear your thimble isn't working. I got this open thimble at Joann that works great (even on the rare occasion when I actually have nails). It will fit on any finger or my thumb. Amazon sells them, too.
Also, I've done the whole tweezers trick, but I found these wonderful John James Gold'n'Glide Milliner Size 10 needles at my LQS & they are
amazing! No more tweezers or fighting with the fabric for me. I tried a whole bunch of different needles before someone recommended these & I must say, they seem to be the needle-version of Aurifil thread. They are Teflon coated & just slide through the fabric no problem. Shaved nearly 2 hours off the time it takes me to do binding.