Hello Dear Reader,

Here’s my latest quilt……….a scrappy block quilt that has used up all of my spare fabric. When I look at it, I can old shirts, dresses from jumble sales, charity shop pillow cases and duvet covers and some of the bargains I bought for less that £1 a fat quarter at the quilting show. It’s the simplest quilt pattern and the design I taught at my most recent quilting workshop. The ladies went away with four blocks made and sewn into a larger blocks and both of them had the beginnings of an amazing quilt.

This time, I decided to duct tape the quilt top to the floor first, right side down. I then laid out the Hobbs batting over the top and cut it to size.

Oh the concentration and really……….I need a bigger house!

I then stand in the middle and roll the batting back to half way across the quilt and lightly spray with 505 spray, which is a temporary adhesive that disappears when the quilt is washed.

Here I am spraying directly onto the quilt top. I know, I know……….this will have the ‘proper’ quilters foaming from the chuff in rage but this is the way I do it! They can get over it and do it their way when they do it. If you do it this way and it works for you, then carry on! If you don’t……then each to their own!

Next, I gently lay the batting on top of the quilt top in tiny increments, making sure it lays down evenly and without any wrinkles.

After a while, I kneel down to do this and smooth out any creases with the flat of my hand. If it all goes terribly wrong then just lift the batting off and reposition. You may, as I did today, get a rip in the batting but it doesn’t really matter. It’s made of cotton and it’s reasonably stable and can ‘bruise’. You’ll not notice it when the quilt is finished.

I’ve used a charity shop vintage single duvet cover (St Micheal early 1980s I think?) and part of a vallance that I bought from a jumble sale with the intention of cutting it up for quilting. I’ve patched the back together as it really becomes expensive to buy enough fabric to back a quilt. I prefer to use dark fabric to back a quilt and this is fine.

I repeat the whole process of flipping half of it back when I know I’ve positioned it where I want it and then spray with 505 and lay it back down, smoothing as I go. The whole process takes about an hour and I need a lie down in a dark room when the whole process is finished.

When I have the three layers stuck together, then I simply rip up the duct tape, quickly in bikini wax style and it never seems to damage the quilt top.