Originally Posted by snowyquilter

Hello, I am new to this site and was thrilled to see other people love embroidering also. I have a Brother Innovis 1500D. I love the machine even though I don't know what I am doing most of the time. My hubby got the machine for me a year ago as a present. He knew I really wanted to start quilting and also liked the embroidery capabilities. I have not made a quilt yet but have done some embroidering. For me, I started learning how to embroider before learning how to do anything else on the machine because I don't actually know how to sew (I am pretty sure the machine is smarter than I am.) I figured the embroidery function was perfect since it basically does all the work. I hope to start quilting soon but I do not have anywhere to set up my machine except my dining room table and am nervous about leaving it there since my 4 month old son is learning to crawl (he can crawl about 6 inches and then falls down) and I am so afraid I am going to drop a needle or pin and not notice and he will find it.

The one thing I don't really understand about embroidering is how to know what stabilizer to use. It seems like there are so many. Most of the things I have embroidered (mostly small wall decorations for my son's nursery) are ok, but there are obviously mistakes in the pattern and I think it is because the fabric is either not staying where it should in the hoop (maybe not tight enough) or that I am not using the right stabilizer. The designs I made were very dense. They were from Anita Goodesign. Does anyone have any basic rules of thumb they use to know what stabilizer to use? I am using mostly 100% cotton fabric from the quilting section of Joannes. Thanks so much for the help. I really love this site and am so glad I found it. I am dying to find a babyproof place to put my machine so I can start quilting.