I'm a little late to the game but here is my two cents. I am working on Winter Wonderland by Crabapple Hill at the moment. I went with muslin for the backing and basted it on just as others have mentioned. However, I have a very talented and prolific quilting friend and she made a smallish snowmen wallhanging. She used something called Sticky Fabri-Solvy which is "printable". She printed her pattern on the solvy, stuck that to her fabric, then stitched through it all. Afterwards, she rinsed the slovy off and was left with just the fabric piece. It turned out great. I did not see any knots or long threads where she carry them over. If I were to start a new piece, this is what I would use now too. Take that all for what it's worth.

I would use the Pellon Featherweight fusible.

I just love to embroider and make a lot of redwork patterns. At first I started with muslin on the back but now I just buy the thinnest white flannel and use that. It works out great, love to use it and it hides all those threads in the back. I don't think I would use any type of iron on stabilizer. It might make the needle hard to go thru the fabric.

One of the ladies in our guild teaches redwork and her own work is beautiful. I asked her about putting some kind of backing on and she said the back should look almost as good as the front and she never uses knots. She has won several awards for her work and still uses no backing. Just my two cents worth.

When our group did the Winter Wonderland embroidered project, a couple ladies used the fusible, I chose to baste muslin to the backs of mine. A word of caution, if you choose to iron fusible, you need to do it BEFORE you trace with a wash away marker or you will set the ink. ALSO one of the ladies used an iron that was too hot, her project had the bubbles that come up from the glue if it's too hot. I do hand embroidery with or without a backing, depending on how I feel at the moment. My latest project, I've basted some warm'n natural to the blocks.

Thank you all again for so much help! I would love to use the flannel but I don't know if I can get it in pure white and that's what it would have to be, so it's going to either be muslin or the fusible interfacing thanks for clearing up that mistake!!). The big thing is I have to hide the threads on the back so whatever will work to do that is what I'm going to use. I guess it's time to get out the embroidery book I bought a few years ago too! Again, my thanks to all!!

Thimblebug6000 - good to know about the heat on the iron cause mine is HOT!

I would like to know where all of you find the redwork patterns that you use if anyone cares to divulge your sources.
Thanks. Gladys

This sounds like a great idea. Will have to try it.

Crabapple Hill has some nice patterns. The one I'm working on is Jolly Old Santa Table Runner by Pattern Press. I just Googled embroidery and redwork patterns and quite a few came up.

My redwork quilt pattern is from Crabapple Hill. They have great embroidery patterns.