I have always wanted to try the quilt pounce but was never sure how messy it was or if it was worth the investment.
I have used both washable ink and disappearing ink pens and have success with both but the best technique I tried was one my sister told me about. I made a Christmas quilt this year and had a very intricate quilt design, made for a long arm quilter, that I wanted to do both on the squares and on the borders. I do not have a long arm quilter, I use my standard sewing machine to do all my own quilting. I did not think that using the pens would be very successful as it is hard to transfer a more detailed design. She told me to make copies of my designs and then cut them out and apply them to the quilt using either spray adhesive or masking tape. I choose the masking tape then sewed through the paper over the design. I used the regular printer paper, she uses tracing paper, to do the copies of the designs. Using this technique I was able to really center my design, I did not find that any paper went through into my machine (however I was careful not to sew over the masking tape because I was afraid that would.) The only drawback I found was because the design had some very small areas, like on the snow flakes, that it took a little time to pick out the smaller pieces of paper that remained on the quilt after pulling the paper off. You do have to be gentle pulling off the paper so you don't pull out the stitches. I liked the technique and would use it again.
Just a footnote, my sister just brought a used long arm quilter with a lazer and cruise control. I am going to visit her at the end of April and bringing a tablerunner to quilt onto. I can't wait. She says it was never used because the woman said she could not see the lazer and my sister made a real steal buying it. When she brought it home she realized that the reason the woman could not see the lazer marker was because she had it installed backwards. My sister paid $1,200.00 for the long arm quilter and it came with the Pffaf long arm quilting machine. I could not believe it!!!! I am so happy for her, she deserves it. but I am also sooooooo jealous, and told her so, LOL :wink: