Naked Quilting

encouragement machine quilting tips Jan 26, 2022

Sorry, no risqué picture to go along with this title!

Not being silly about this either. There are advantages to naked quilting. In my trunk show I tell a story about the project pictured above and some middle of the night, pajama free sewing. It involves sharp scissors and my husband, but not how you think! Recently, I was telling the story to an online retreat group and it led to a funny discussion about naked quilting. They weren't expecting what came next.

Struggling with machine quilting large quilts at home? One of my best pieces of advice is to lose the shirt and quilt topless then. 

Totally serious here. I find that when dealing with all the bulk of a large quilt on my lap or over my shoulder my shirt gets in the way. It twists and turns and gets caught up in the quilt, increasing my aggravation. So one day I simply took my shirt off. What a revelation! Everything moved much more smoothly and my annoyance disappeared. Not being annoyed goes a long way to enjoying the process of machine quilting. I do this all the time now. Bra optional.

I've got more tips for machine quilting large quilts at home here.