Creative Quilting Tips

All quilters have quilting tips they've discovered to make their quilting project go more smoothly or they have found a creative use of their tools and materials. Here are some I've learned or picked up from other people.

If YOU would like to share one of your favorite tips, use the "contact us" and put "Quilting Tip" in the subject line. I'd love to post it here and give you the credit for submitting it!

Batting scraps make excellent dust rags.

The flannel side of a vinyl tablecloth makes a portable and inexpensive design wall.

Save your patterns and templates in clear plastic page protectors and file them in a binder.

Take the excess fabrics from your quilt project and piece them together to make a coordinating throw pillow.

Use a glue stick to place appliques on your fabric. No pins to move out of the way when stitching!

Cheap garden gloves with "gripper" palms make great, inexpensive quilting gloves. You might want to cut off the tips of the fingers.

Baste together the cut edges of your fabric before you prewash. It will keep the fraying to a minimum.

Use wax paper as your pattern template if you need to see through to the fabric design underneath.

Regular chalk works well to mark designs on your quilt fabric. The marks brush away nicely.

Use a small piece of sandpaper to sharpen your marking pencil. the tip won't break off as easily as when using a regular sharpener.

When marking diagonal lines on your fabric squares while making triangles, start in the middle and mark out to each corner. You'll get straighter lines and less shifting of the fabric.

Use an empty pill bottle with a hole punched in the top as a holder for your broken needles. When it's full.. toss!

Tired of picking off all those cut threads after using your seam ripper? Use a lint roller? Lightly roll across the affected area.

Put a couple of plastic wall file or magazine holders on your wall near your work area for scissors, rotary cutters and other tools.

An empty tissue box next to your sewing table or machine makes a stylish "mini-trash bin" for all those little pieces of excess fabric and threads you trim away.