Sometimes I'm so smart I can hardly stand myself. I was going to butt two straight-edged pieces of batting and zigzag them together. Set the SM to a long and wide stitch. Then, I said to myself, 'Self, which foot would work best?" Self seemed to think that the gathering foot might do a great job. It does. The gathering foot is unpretentious. It only looks like a folded bit of metal - flat on the top, the bottom and across the front. The reason it received an audition for the chore was that there is nothing on it to hang and tangle into the fibers of the batting, just a plain, smooth surface. Of course, you may need to set your SM so it won't really gather one to the other - but the gathering foot did a super fast and easy joining for me. Try it the next time you're feeling frugal or desperate and must piece batting. Polly
Piecing Batting
Feb 26, 2009
2 Replies
Glad you found one that works well for me. On my Elna, I like to use the blind hem foot; it has a little guide in the middle and I guide the 2 pieces of batting on either side of the little guide on the foot. It keeps them close together but also keeps them from overlapping. I use the longest zigzag.
I like to overlap the two pieces slightly, cut through both layers and pull away the excess. Then I make some marks on both sides of the cuts with a washable marker and try to keep these lined up as I sew so I don't stretch one side more than the other. I usually make a rather wavy cut on the theory that it may be less noticeable on the finished quilt than a straight seam. However, the join is usually so flat, I don't think it would be a problem.
Julia > Sometimes I'm so smart I can hardly stand myself. I was going to butt two
I've had good luck doing the wavy thing, too, but made a happy discovery--a plain, multipurpose, foot does just fine with a multistitch zigzag, and the multistitch seems to handle much better.
--Heidi
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> Glad you found one that works well for me. On my Elna, I like to use the
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