My favorite problem solving tool is a good night’s sleep. I don’t think I’ve ever solved a large problem(well) after 4pm. At least as I’ve aged, I think my brain starts to slow a bit after 4 and doesn’t tackle things as well as it does first thing in the morning. So I’ve found that if I haven’t tackled the day’s trials by 4, it’s best to set them aside and sleep on them. Cut to, the quilting of my December quilt.
Last Spring I made a hex quilt with a fleece backing that pushed me to swear off fleece quilting for good. Depending on your quality of fleece, it can move more than I’d like for quilt backing and makes me struggle with puckering. But I have an every day, sitting on the couch, fleece blanket given to us from my inlaws a few years ago that is really warm and wonderful on one side, but bumpy and has become rough and permanently linty on the other side.
I decided to fix the side I dislike with a quilt top. I found a design on Pinterest that Brandon and I agreed would look nice enough when it inevitably ends up on our couch all the time. I made a pattern out of it and got started. The piecing was quick, simple, and lovely. I was very pleased until I started quilting it to the fleece. I pin basted as I normally do but the fleece moved so much under my needle , the first line made my master piece look like a master piece of garbage. I promptly walked away and stewed on it for a few days. On a morning 4 days later, I woke up with an epiphany. I remembered reading a blog from my favorite quilt blogger, Suzy Quilts, about different basting techniques. She mentioned a technique using basting spray that I remember breezing past because I have always had great success with pins and Suzy wasn’t super keen on it either. But as I woke up that Thursday morning, it was this technique that I imagined to be the only technique to save my new quilt. I re-read Suzy’s blog post and quickly ordered some basting spray.
I don’t think I’ve ever been so anxious waiting on a delivery in my life. When it arrived at noon on Sunday, I was ready with garbage bags to lay under the quilt outside on my patio, because in Suzy’s blog comments, people recommended spraying outside to limit the mess. The comments also recommended ironing after sandwiching your fabric, so I did that too. I was so happy with the way it stuck together for the first half of my quilting. As I got to the second half, things started to get away from me. Gathering fabric within my machine had caused the basting to un-stick a bit. So I still have some puckering at the back and I have some pulling in the front, but this finished product is WAY better than it would have been without the basting spray. Basting spray won’t be a staple quilting tool for me going forward, but it’s nice to have it if I decide to quilt with fleece again some day. And no one will notice the flaws as this is crumbled in a ball on my couch :).
