Today, I began a new love affair.
For the first time, I used basting spray to baste my quilt. This is something of a monster size quilt for me - it's 73" x 67". Maybe not huge for some quilters, but that size is about the limit of the floor space I have without moving shelving or a sofa to lay it out and baste it. So, pinning it would have been a time sucking nightmare. Not to mention how sore my back would have been after it.
I have been cutting and piecing the top of this quilt speedily all week in order to meet a birthday deadline. This quilt is for the niece of one of my real life BFFs, Helen and it is a Russian doll themed quilt, for more than a few reasons. Helen asked me to make it as big as I could and it is a truly generous lap size I think.
This morning, when I finished piecing the backing strips, I took myself off to the strangely tidy playroom, opened the patio doors and got spraying. I got some great tips from Judith and read Kristie's great spray basting tute. I flew through it and it went perfectly, although I was a bit heavy handed with the spray at the start. I cannot tell you how much I love this product. Seriously brilliant stuff and I can't believe how quickly I had my quilt basted. I'm a convert :-)
Here it is, all ready for quilting, earlier today and at this stage I have half of it stippled. Despite the fact that handling a quilt this size for free motion quilting is something akin to wrestling a walrus, the quilting is going very well. Not having to unpin every few minutes is so liberating and I haven't encountered any problems with puckers or rippling so far.
I got the spray from my fave fabric genie, Janette in River Fabrics and, because she couriered it rather than post (because of postal regulations) I got a few cans and some fabric and Aurifil threads, making the shipping super reasonable per item. I will be interested to see how many quilts I get out of a can (I bought the large size). For now, I'm still in love!
