AnnaF

white chalk works fine on dark areas on a quilt..I use that a lot..I would not recommend colored chalk tho..Id rather err on the side of caution. Chalk brushes or vacuum off the chalk once quilted.

newquilter10

The Frixions come in colors now.

San Luis

I had a light bulb moment once when I dripped toothpaste down the front of a black t-shirt I was wearing. Now I mix toothpaste (make sure it's white, not gel) with enough water to thin in a small sprayer and spray over the stencil. The only downside is that I have to be patient while it dries, but it leaves a nice crisp line that doesn't rub off and washes out completely even if I've ironed over it. I've thought of using rubbing alcohol for faster drying but haven't tested it. Just know that water works. It even works on other colors, even white, although it's a little harder to see.

MarleneC

One of the Craftsy teachers uses a spongy type paint brush and dips that into the chalk powder to mark her quilts--she uses a lot of stencils.

Janette

I mostly use the Golden Threads. It is a pain to pick out the paper afterwards but you have saved time by not having to mark the whole quilt. I trace out my design of a piece of the paper, then cut out about 10-12 pieces the same size. Pin the original design on top of the pile of papers. Put a size 16 needle in your machine then free motion stitch the design on your sewing machine, without using thread. You now have multiple copies of your design to place on your quilt. I just pin them but you can buy sticky dots to hold them down. This works best with relatively simple designs that you can easily see when you're looking at just holes in the paper. It's also a great way to do borders. A border design doesn't always work out well depending on the length of the border. Using the paper I can cut out pieces of a design and space them out on a border without having to do a lot of math to make the design fit.

VickiM

I bought this & tried to use it...I found it doesn't mark well on darker fabrics (can't really see it) & is so soft that it breaks easily. Anyone use this successfully that can give me some hints to use it successfully also? Thanks.

janedee

I use artist watercolour crayons all the time for marking my quilts, bought a small set of them, but always test the colour you want to use on spare fabric. Easy to use and washes out totally.

DOTTYMO

The best help I found was mark quilt before you sandwich. At this stage the fabric is firmer and easier to mark with any marking method, although chalk can rub off.

Weezy Rider

I have a white pencil that works on most dark fabrics, and a pounce works on others. For light fabrics, the Frixions work.

My big problem is patterned fabric that has both light and darks. That's when I've had to use gold paper.

Sewnoma

I swear by old school tailor's chalk. I have it in red, blue, yellow, and white; between those colors I can mark anything! It always comes right out, zero problems. There's a reason they are still making that stuff after all these years...it works!

Only thing it doesn't really work for is really fine line intricate stuff - hard to get a really small point that lasts. But for drawing in guidance for FMQ...works fine!