I bought some warm and natural to use for a baby quilt. I washed my fabric. I was going to wash the batting, but it said not to. It says on the package it will shrink 3 %. Since I have not used it before, what will it do to my quilt when it is washed? Will it cause the quilt to buckle? Not sure I want to use it if it will. Would appreciate any help I can get. I am new to quilting and really don't know the in's and outs of how and what to use. Thanks so much.
Sue

I like the crinkle look. I want my batting to shrink. I have found that poly batting doesn't shrink.

You can spray the batting with water, and toss it in the dryer with a damp towel.
You don't want to wash it, the agitation can make it all fall apart.

If you don't preshrink it, it will make the quilt crinkle, making it look like an antique quilt. But this will also happen if you don't prewash your fabrics :D:D:D

I am a dedicated pre-washer of fabric, but I've never pre-washed batting ... and most of the batting I've used is Warm & Natural. My finished quilts have had minimal crinkling, just enough to give it a "real" quilt look but not too much.

Here's a close up of a quilt - all fabric pre-washed, batting not pre-washed. Quilt was laundered after quilting/binding.

This piece did not have heavy quilting on it. The closer the quilting, the more crinkle you will get.

Welcome to the board from Southern California!

it will be fine- and the shrinkage amount is dependant on the amount of quilting done on the quilt- a quilt that is heavily quilted shrinks less than one that has very little quilting.
we all use those batts- the shrinkage is really minimal---3% leaves 97%...it is just the right amount to make it look like a quilt

Thank you everyone for your answers. This helps me out so much. Now I can get to work. :-)
Sue

It just gives it a small crinkle look; very pretty. you can spritz it with water and put it in the dryer and that may shrink it some but I wouldn't worry about it. The amount of crinkling will aslo be detremined by how much you quilt it.

I like the crinkled look. Makes the quilt look old. I do not wash my fabric first. Don't wash the batting unless the package says you can. I'm afraid you'll end up with a glob of cotton and ruin your washer and dryer.
Sue

I've never tried not washing Warm & Natural on a quilt I intended for a destination other than the wall. That's 3 inches on a 100-inch quilt... what does that look like? Is it noticeable? It would seem like it would be.

I hand soak the batting and then either lay it flat or tumble it.... tumbling it sometimes makes it pill up a bit, though, so I have to pick at it before using it... so I usually just wring it and lay it out on big beach towels--in the sun in the summer it dries quickly, in the winter indoors I swap the wet towels after the first several minutes. The wringing, done gently, doesn't seem to adversely affect it.