Originally Posted by Candace
Not cheating, but the reason we don't use them more is that they don't look great on the quilt back and the 3 quilting layers, moving through the machine doing an intricate design, sometimes can make the design wonky.
I mainly would use decorative stitching on the quilt top before it was sandwiched and then it goes through the machine smoothly. Throw in 3 layers, and not so smoothly:>
I can see how that would happen. I tried a few different stitches on a scrap 'sandwhich' and didn't like the way most of them came out. A lot of them you can't make big enough, and some just get messed up working with three layers. I thought this 'surf stitch' came out pretty well going through three layers.
Although, I tried using a walking foot and it wouldn't work. Had to use what my machine hand book calls a 'special foot.' LOL