Need help - what do I FMQ on this quilt - new FMQ'er
 

Yesterday I posted a picture of my first piece that I have done anything other than SITD or straight line quilting on. I have been practicing off and on for 3 or 4 years but just never had the nerve to do it on a real item. I finally did a small wall hanging (the picture I posted yesterday) and now I have a baby quilt that I'd like to FMQ - just want to do some stippling on. I already did a serpentine stitch around all the blocks and now I want to fill in with the stippling but what do I do about the area inside the animals - will it be okay to just leave that area unquilted? I am sure I would really mess it up if I tried to echo quilt around them - not so good at that. Any help or ideas would be great. The baby was born a week ago today - a great granddaughter.
Thank you!
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i myself would do a little meandering around the animals.

Very cute quilt. Outlining the appliques would really look good for the back side (although tedious and time consuming for sure). I like Joset's suggestion of meandering ... however, if you can't outline the appliques, I would probably do a medium to large meander pattern all over the quilt. Good luck!

Your quilt has the look of an antique quilt so I would crosshatch the background as they did in those days. Very cute animals with a Sunbonnet Sue in the center. Very Cute.

You need to let your batting be your guide. The batting will tell you the maximum distance apart your quilting lines will be. Measure the diagonal of your animal blocks to make sure that you don't exceed that number. Also, on an item that's going to be dragged around and laundered a bunch, you want to err on the side of more quilting. Off hand, I would not leave them unquilted. The suggestions of the previous posters are all good.

So if I did that would I meander the animals and the sashing as well. Am I right that to meander is on the same order at stippling only on a larger scale?