Minky Baby Blanket Question
 

I am new to quilting and have just made a minky blanket with minky on both sides & warm and natural inside. It was a "flip & sew" quilt so is only quilted where the strips are joined. My questions is should I do more quilting, especially in the center section which is 7" tall? My concern is when it is washed and dried the cotton batting will shrink but the minky won't. Any thoughts before I mail this off?

Thanks, Betsy

welcome to the forum. Yes, you are correct. The batting will shrink and the minkee won't. W & N can be left unquilted up to a maximum of 10" in ALL directions (up-down AND side to side AND the diagonal). This is to prevent the batting from tearing or bunching. You say the center section is 7" tall... not sure exactly what you mean. If it's a 7" square, you are right at the edge of the 10" maximum and might want to consider some extra quilting. If the quilt is totally in strips, then you will need some sort of horizontal quilting across the whole thing so that the max distance is 10".

I would probably tie-tack in several spots inside that 7" tall area. You could use contrasting, coordinating, or a blending color thread or yarn. I would probably do it by machine (you can use a decorative stitch) just because it would be difficult to pull yarn or heavy thread through all those layers. Or, you could machine quilt decorative lines through that area.

Next time you might want to use a polyester batting such as Hobbs PolyDown, which will not shrink. I have also seen minky baby quilts done without any batting at all.