I am a puddler, too...I have my sewing machine set in a full sized office desk...I have about 20 inches to the left side and that helps. I also have a shallow drawer on that side and I pull it out as well. I keep wanting my husband to invent something that keeps the quilt from sliding off the end though.

For right now I just use a card table to put the rest of the quilt on.

I puddle too...I find the roll method too stiff. it also helps if you can put your machine in a corner, that way you can loosely stack any excess.

My sewing machine table is fairly large (30"?) to the left of the machine. I usually pull the machine away from the wall to allow the quilt to flop down behind the machine.

I only have 6 1/2-inches in the throat of my machine and it's only about 5 or so inches high inside there...so rolling was out for me. When I tried that it was like a log and so heavy...so I, also, puddle and only worry about the few inches under my hands as I FMQ.

If the quilt is any larger than a baby quilt, I spray baste about 1/2 of the quilt (or less depending on the size) into a sandwich and simply hand tack around the outside of the part that has no batting to keep it from flopping around...this way the quilt isn't so heavy. I quilt that part of the quilt ...add back some batting..quilt that part...etc. Makes the weight so much lighter and not so much under that throat.

I have a 23" x 60" table shoved up to my sewing table on my left. My sewing table is shoved up to a window with a small drop down to a ledge. This handles the weight of the quilt on my left and behind the machine. As for as that part that goes into my lap...I put it up on my chest and a little over my shoulder...this keeps it from dragging on my needle from the front and keeps it from hanging on the edge of my machine table as I feed it through.

This seems to be adequate for the time being.

Use a card table, ironing board, chair, dinning table, etc. what ever you have in the house.

I move folding tables into place to hold the quilt. Two tables for a queen size works great. You can go professional and have a hook hanging from the ceiling with pullys and take the weight off the quilt that way.

Flop and puddle here, too. I set my machine on the far right corner of the table so there's a large area of table to the left and behind, and then slip my ironing board UNDER the table so it is nearly level with it, and that helps with the left and in front of my machine. The basic thing here is just making sure the whole thing is supported so you don't have a bunch of drag to fight. Gravity is a law.

As for a puddle v. roll, it used to make me cuss when I would bump my elbow on the roll. So I don't do that anymore. (Roll, not cuss. There is still cussing. This is, after all, machine quilting.)

Another puddle'n'flopper here. I have my sewing machine all the way to the right on a desk and a home-made elevated bed extension around it so that I have about 36" to the left of the needle, and about 18" behind. Still a lot of dragging and wrestling (and cussing), though. There was a thread last October about different approaches people have taken to extend their machine bed (so not as much weight pulling down) - but of course I can't find it now!

Alison
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