Beginner Quilting Series: Basting and Quilting

Hi, Everyone!  This week I am working on basting and quilting my On Point Quilt that we made in our #onpointQAL

In case you missed the QAL and want to make this quilt now, here are all the links!

Week 1-Choosing Fabric- here
Week 2- Cutting the Fabric- here
Week 3- Make 8 blocks- here
Week 4- Make 8 blocks- here
Week 5- Make 9 blocks- here
Week 6- Assemble the top- here

This post is part of a series!  You can read the previous post here- What's Next After You've Made a Quilt Top.

Today we will be talking about basting and quilting!

You should have your three layers of the quilt ready now.  If not see the previous post here.  If so, let's continue...

Get your quilt top, batting, and backing and let's baste your quilt!

Basting simply means holding your layers of the quilt together temporarily.  When your quilt is basted- the three layers are held together- it is called a quilt sandwich :)  There are three common ways to baste- thread basting, pin basting, and spray basting.  I typically use thread basting for small projects so I'm not going to talk about it here.

When I baste a big quilt, I either pin baste or spray baste.  Each has pluses and minuses and you should try both at some point to decide which one you prefer.  

Disclaimer- This the process of how I baste a quilt.  I am not claiming that this is the only way  to do it or that this is even the "right" way to do it.  It is just how I do it.

PIN BASTING

When I pin baste, I used curved safety pins (these).  

First I lay my backing down with the wrong side facing up.  

I have found that the best way is to make sure you backing is nicely laid out- even, flat, and held nicely in place.  Lots of people use tape.  They tape it to their floor, continue with the basting process and then take the tape off at the end.  I don't have a spot where I can nicely tape a quilt backing.  So I usually baste on top of a large throw rug that I have and I use clamps to secure the backing to the corners of the rug.  You might have to try it a few times before you find exactly what will work best for you.

So, backing wrong side facing up, secured in some manner to the floor (tape, clamps, whatever works).  Then you spread the batting out on top of the backing.  Make sure it nice and flat, no bumps or lumps, and even across the whole backing.

Here I'm using The Warm Company Warm & Plush batting.  This is a favorite of mine!!

Finally you'll lay your quilt top on top of the batting.  Again, spread it evenly over the batting.  Make sure there are no lumps or bumps.  Spread it with your hands so that it is nicely flat and exactly flat how it's meant to be but not pulled tight or distorted in any sections.

Then you will start at one edge and begin pinning all three layers together with the curved safety pins.  

You should pin about every 4" in every direction.  I tend to pin in rows and once I have a few rows pinned, I slowly roll the quilt up where I have already pinned so that I can reach the remaining areas.  Continue pinning and rolling up as you go until the whole quilt is pinned.

Typically, once I have everything pinned, I trim any excess batting and backing so that I am left with about a 2-3" overhang around the whole quilt top.

Now you can start quilting!

SPRAY BASTING

I don't spray baste large quilts very often.  So, while I do have a method that I tend to use, I haven't refined it as much as my pin basting method.  You'll find that each time you do a quilting task, you perfect it even more.  I pin basted my On Point quilt so I do not have photos of these steps.  But, nonetheless, I will tell you how I would do it.

First I lay out my batting.  Nice and smooth, make sure there are no bumps or lumps and that it is spread even across the whole surface that you are working.

Then, following the instructions of the spray baste that you are using.  I really like Therm O Web Spray N Baste.

I spread out the backing on top.  Then starting in the middle, I spray baste a small section.  I make sure the backing is laying properly on the batting and then move to another section slightly out from the middle.  Continue repeating these steps, working from the middle outward, until the whole backing is basted to the batting.

Since generally, I made sure my backing is at least 4" bigger than my quilt top, I am comfortable cutting away excess batting (the batting that goes beyond the backing) here.  Once I cut the excess batting, I carefully flip the entire thing over and get it laid out perfectly on my work surface again.

Once the already basted backing/batting is laid out, batting side up, I begin to lay out my quilt top on it.  Repeat the steps as you did before when basting the backing.  Start in the middle, spray baste a small section, make sure it is laying correctly and properly adhered.  Then move outward and continue basting until you have completed the whole top.

Now you can start quilting!


QUILTING

There is so much information on how to quilt a quilt.  You can find lots of tutorials and videos by just doing a google search and/or a YouTube search.  For that reason, I'm not going to go super in depth here.  I am going to tell you how I typically quilt my quilts (the ones that I do myself) and then let you decide what's going to work best for you.

When I first started quilting, I found the actual quilting part to be very intimidating.  If you feel the same way, the best way to move past that is to just quilt one.  Know that it won't be completely perfect but I think that's ok.  I was always worried that I'd ruin the beautiful top that I spent so long making (and sometimes I still worry like this).  But, you'll never be great at quilting unless you try and practice.  So, go for it!



If you want to start very basic, go for straight line quilting.  In this type, you will actually just sew straight lines across the quilt sandwich.  You can use very organic, natural lines by just sewing the lines and not worrying if they are straight or not or you can mark your quilt top with a ruler and quilt marking tool to make lines so that when you sew, you sew right on the lines and get very straight, perfect lines.  Typically when I'm marking quilts, I use a Hera marker (which isn't actually a marker at all).  Its great because it doesn't actually write on the quilt top at all so there is no chance of leaving rogue marking lines behind.  

You could also free motion quilt your quilt.  There are online classes on this and videos galore.  I do find though that practice, trial, and error are the best way to understand free motion quilting.  If you wanted to practice a specific free motion design before you began on your quilt, I'd recommend drawing it a few times on paper.  Then I'd recommend, taking 2 fat quarters and 1 piece of batting that is the same size.  Make a quilt sandwich (spray basting is quick and easy especially with a quilt sandwich that is this size).  Then practice the design on this fat quarter quilt just to get the hang of it.  Once you are comfortable, move to your big quilt and just go for it.

One thing that I think is important enough to mention here is that when you start each row of quilting, start in the extra batting that you left around the quilt top.  When you start in the  batting, it helps make sure that the stitches are even by the time you get to the quilt top.  Then that part (the batting around the top) gets cut off once you are finished quilting.

Here is the free motion quilting I did on the On Point quilt.  I am still very much a beginner at free motion quilting.  And even though it doesn't always turn out like I picture it, I really enjoy doing it.  Also I know with each quilt I do, I'll improve.

Also, you always have the option of sending your quilt top to a long arm quilter to quilt it for you!

That's all for this post.  It's a lot of information so let me know if you have any specific questions.  In my new post in this series, I'll be sharing how I bind my quilts.

You can subscribe to my blog to get notified of new posts if you'd like and you can follow me on Instagram here 

You can share any posts related to this QAL by using the hashtags #onpointqal and #jessicadayonpatterns

Talk to you soon,

Jessica