cricket_iscute

Thank you, thank you, thank you for that link!

I had been thinking of doing something like this, but seeing it done really helps. This would be a much faster way to quilt charity quilts than sandwiching and pin basting on a too-small table. Several things occur to me:

1) You would not need to zig zag non-fusible batting. You could use Elmer's glue on it. You would glue it first to the backing and then, if needed, put some glue on top of the batting and smooth the top over it.

2) You would not need fusible batting at all if you used Elmer's glue, and in doing so, you wouldn't have to press the quilt as often as she does. It seems to me a good idea to glue the batting to the back and then glue the batting to the top. Then quilt. You would use small drops of glue, of course.

3) You could easily use a walking foot and a decorative stitch to quilt. You wouldn't have to do fmq. In that case, you could do lines of stitching from top to bottom and side to side, or do diagonal lines, or big wavy lines, or something else. (For me, this means I could do piecing and quilting on the one Singer 500 in a cabinet I have in the living room and would not have to go downstairs when my knees are bad.)

4) For charity quilts, this cries for a scrappy backing. Regarding backing, I recently started using fabric off the bolt for backing homeless quilts as it was easier. I could do a horizontal piece of fabric as wide as needed, and then have one horizontal seam, letting the ~44 inch width be doubled for a quilt up to 88 inches. However, I would switch methods and make vertical seams (with either one fabric or scrappy) and quilt in rows, as she does. My quilts usually have more blocks down than across.

I think this method would require a lot less work and time!

Cricket