Sew Modern Monday post- hope this counts!

Okay, so Sew Modern Monday at Canoe Ridge Creations is for modern sewing finishes- a finished quilt top counts right? I hope so, because I am posting- so comment to warn me if it doesn't! I am itching to share though!
This is the improv quilt I am making from Art Gallery fabric scraps sent by Pat Bravo for Project Linus quilts. These fabrics were a blast to work with, and it was a great challenge for me to sew a project using just these scraps. So great a challenge in fact that I failed just a bit. I had to use some Kona snow yardage from my stash to make up the quilt backing- the remaining scraps Ms. Bravo sent were too skinny to make it up. Cheater cheater me. But hey, they were my rules that I broke.
Picture disclaimer- I am having a wicked hard time with my camera, so these are not lovely, but they do convey the idea. However, the pics of the sewn together pieces are terrible, so I guess you have to take my word for it? The last picture is terrible, but proof they are done...

See? The last shows it all taped up to guide my not-usually-very-straight line quilting. So far...not so good. Lots of tension issues. I seem to have these worst with my King Tut thread- anyone else? Maybe I need a new machine...

One last bit- a rearrangement of my to be done Little Apples string quilt. I will need to add borders too.

Linking up...

Little Apples quilt blocks ready to be sewn up and a new project

My Little Apples blocks are ready to be made into a quilt top! I am excited to get this ball rolling, as I hope to give this as a Christmas gift this year. Plus, I just love to complete a project. 

I think the quilting should go easy too- I plan to just to straight line quilting in random arrangement across the entire quilt top. I think this will be best considering this is the largest quilt top I have made to date, I am quilting it on my machine at home, and there are all kinds of lines on this quilt already, so no need to distract any more! It is already quite busy, though I am liking it this way. I would like some opinions though.

1. I think the top needs to be larger, because I would like it to be more throw sized than baby sized, but I am out of fabric from my jelly roll! Should I just do a border in the same grey as the main lattice fabric, go for a brighter color from the Little Apples line, or do half blocks with the strips from Little Apples and a solid on the other half? (And does all that even make sense?)
2. I have not started piecing because I do not have a 1/4" quilting foot (horrendous, I know), but I did all the blocks without one...will it make a difference?
3. What color for the binding- grey, red, the dark green or turquoise from the blocks?

Also, just to add things to a list already chock full and unfinished with the holidays so close, I signed on to make a quilt for Project Linus through Pat Bravo's blog. She sent out bags of scraps to volunteers, and I started cutting into mine and arranging by color to do a quilt from Fresh Quilting- Nate's Quilt. I love the idea of improv piecing and hope that makes it come together pretty fast. The scraps are gorgeous by the way- even if I mess up the quilt design someone is going to love this quilt just for the fabrics! Thanks for the materials. Art Gallery Fabrics and Ms. Bravo!