I'm not sure why I've been resistant to spray baste. I'm generally in favor of shortcuts, but I've been a little bit stodgy in sticking to my pins. I did try the spray once before without much luck. But after seeing my growing pile of quilt tops, I figured it was time to bite the bullet and see if I could figure this out.
I found lots of helpful tips online (like
Kelly's video and
Kristie's tutorial). It does seem that brand matters, and most quilters seem to prefer 505 spray. (I got mine
here--I've heard it's the best price around.)
And, guess what? It worked. Within a weekend, I had two quilts basted, quilted, and awaiting hand-stitched binding. (Machine stitching the binding is one shortcut I haven't been able to take. I've tried, but I'm no good at it. And hand-stitching the binding is my favorite.) Will I stick with the spray? Hard to say. It's definitely a time-saver, but spraying all of those chemicals on a quilt bothers me a little. I bought several cans, so I'll be using the spray for a while!
One of my finishes was this (Boom Boom) Pow-Wow quilt.
(Pow-Wow pattern from Cluck Cluck Sew.) It's a fun, dynamic quilt that's great for small-scale prints. Most of the prints are from the Boy Crazy line by Riley Blake.
The large-scale print from Boy Crazy is really fun, but it didn't work with the Pow-Wow pattern, so it ended up on the back!
And...all finished up!
One note on this pattern: Allison's fabric requirements don't include much room for error. Allison says right there on the pattern to cut carefully because you'll need the full width of fabric, but I still made a cutting mistake (or two...) that caused me to rework my plan. (Just to be clear: The cutting instructions are perfect. I happen to be a dunce.) If you're prone to cutting mistakes, you might order a little extra fabric. :)
