Stablizing all over fmq?
 

Almost finished fmq on DSM.. Baptist fan on quilt and feathers in wide border. I sitd along both sides of thin blue border, and machine basted the outer edges. I now see a few small tucks on the back near the blue border. They will probably disappear when i wash this, and its for me (!), but how do I avoid this in the future?
Thank you!?

Love the fabric. I use Hobbs batting and my backing and fabric never seems to move even when doing FMQ. If you use pins, maybe did you use enough of them?? I usually pin using my right hand in a fist for judging pinning. I love the Baptist fan and if you can do FMQ on you DSM, you can do this stencil instead of stippling.

I don't know about the tucks issue. I don't have any experience with fmq. But I want to tell you I love your quilt and its soft colors. So pretty!

Your quilt is beautiful!!!! Seems me to that those of us who quilt with DSM will always struggle with puckers--isn't that one of the beauties of a long arm?

I suppose spray basting would be one solution that helps.

I spray baste, and in the case of a large quilt that will be handled a lot when pushing and pulling on a DSM, I will also pin. It takes a little more time, but I almost never have puckers.

I did spray baste...505, which I use all the time. I also used a new batting-Quilters Dream cotton. Love the drape of this batting....hopefully that wasn't the problem! Maybe next time I will use more spray and add a few pins. Thanks!

Tartan, I did the SITD before I quilted the fans....you are right-stretching the bias is probably the culprit.

Maniac, I used a stencil to mark the quilt....would love to use the rulers for DSM, but I have not yet taken that plunge! :)

Love the quilt and quilting.

After you spray baste your quilt sandwich together, do you iron the quilt front and back? It sets the spray and also gives you an opportunity to see and fix any possible fabric excess/ripples that happened in the layering process. if I am doing an all over pattern and have concerns about the sandwich staying together well, I will either add a few pins or run a few lines of basting stitches with water soluble thread through the center of the quilt before starting an all over design. Just don't iron your quilt with the WS thread in it, as it will just melt with the iron!

Thanks for the advise! I need to get some water soluble thread! I never thought of that! I could have machine basted the quilt sandwich after spraying, huh?! Love all of the wisdom here!