I have never done this BUT. I had read a tip about glad press and seal. it had to do with painting. it said to used glad press and seal to protect nearby surfaces. So last week, I was painting a hutch, but didnt want the counter part to get paint on it, so I put on press ans seal, while I applied my 3 coats of paint. it rally worked good for keeping paint off my surface. THEN when I removed it there was a lot of residue on my counter. I tried wiping, then soap, then something stronger, then goo gone!!! the goo gone did work, but I have a new fear of press and seal residue!!!

How about a different "motif" for each block pattern? Could be fun!

The press and seal is a great product but it does have it's limitations. On a totally different sideline I have used it on the back of my large square rulers to keep them from slipping. I have the Invisigrip but ran short and they both work equally well.

I don't like stitch in the ditch - you can't see the stitching and it is often hard to do because of going thru multiple layers. Without seeing the pattern, my first inclination is just put an X thru each block ~ lots of straight lines and you can mark them w/ masking tape. Easy Peasy.

I don't get the purpose of the press & seal??? I just use frixion pen or pencil. It doesn't come off, even w/ the rubbing of my hand over the quilt w/ the hand quilting.

That sounds like a great idea!

I tried to hand quilt through P&S and had a tough time with it. Had to really puncture the P&S and since it's slick, it slowed down my rocking. Works great with machine quilting, but I won't use it for hand-quilting. YMMV.

If your scrappy is very scrappy (with lots and lots of seams) you might want to go with a larger motif, or one of the widely spaced cross-hatch or diagonal lines mentioned before - keeping handquilting even across seams can be difficult, and frustrating! I know it doesn't show off your stitching very much, but SITD on the ditch side of your squares does make it easy to be consistent....

Alison

Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I usually don't have a problem deciding how to handquilt my "masterpieces". This one really had me stumped. I knew I could count on my fellow quilters to help out!

I also hand quilt. The patterns I use are all the traditional ones that "Grandma" would have made so I quilt each block 1/4" from seam. When I look at the ones my DH's grandmother made, that's how she did it and guess what? All the stitches aren't exactly the same length? We admire those so much but somehow don't notice that the stitches are always even. Hand quilters, let's stop being so hard on ourselves! Let's enjoy the process and keep up the tradition of hand quilting!

The easiest way to quilt is echo quilting as you won't be quilting through seams. Stiching in the ditch is the hardest type of hand quilting, or it is for me as I can't stay in the ditch. I like the design to show on the back and this way it is as pretty as the front.