Pounce Pad Question
 

Thinking about trying a Pounce Pad to mark some baby quilts. Do you "pounce" the whole quilt at one time or just a section? I'll be putting the quilts on my Grace frame and quilting with a 9" throat Janome machine. I'm thinking a section at a time?? Also is there a color of Pounce chalk to stay away from? Any help you can give me will be greatly appreciated.

yellow is usually no good in any kind of marker. green too for me. the pounce is supposed to be "wiped" over the stencil. didn't work for me. i pounced hard and that worked. i ended up giving my pounce away.

I struggle to get it to work, too. The demo makes it look so easy, but somehow at home it doesn't work out like that for me.

I started with the blue (wash off) chalk, but the action of sewing sort of "bounced" it all away. The white iron-off seems to stick a little better but it still just kind of vanishes from the movement of sewing.

I haven't figured out what I'm doing wrong, yet.

In the beginning, you have to "charge" the pad by banging it with the lid on pretty hard to get the powder flowing in the correct direction. Basically, when you see a good amount of powder start to show up on the pad, you should be ready to go. Before each swipe, you have to charge it again by banging it once or twice. Leah Day has a good demo video on Youtube.

I do find that I have to swipe/rub it back and forth a couple times over the stencil to get it to show well. I press down fairly firmly as I swipe. Maybe my eyes aren't that good. You need to hold the stencil down really well too, so that it doesn't shift while you swipe.

I mark small sections at a time, and after marking, I spray with spray hairspray. It seems to help set the powder long enough to quilt it. If you're having problems with your hopping foot bouncing the powder right off, you could try modifying your foot so that it hovers over the quilt sandwich like Leah Day does?

Yes, this^^. My sewing machine also made the chalk bounce off leaving only a faint outline that I couldn't follow. I'm having much better luck using Press and Seal and drawing on it through the stencil lines with a Crayola Ultra Washable.

don't use blue! I tried that and could not get it all out. Very diappointed

didn't like the pounce - just did not work no matter how many times I ran it across the quilt! much prefer the Mark-B-Gone pens. the markings come right out with cold water.

I have used Pounce successfully...
pounce first on a table...then wipe across the stencil...
spritzed a little water to prevent the chalk from bouncing off...
did a row at a time...
used the iron off type

I do not have a Pounce Pad, but I have heard you can accomplish the same thing with a foam type paint brush from the hardware store. I agree with the others who suggest doing a small section at a time.