Safety Pin vs Adhesive Spray Basting

I used adhesive spray for the first time to baste my Baby Bee Quilt WIP [work in progress]!! I’m so excited because it worked really well.

For those of you who don’t know anything about quilting, “basting” is when you put the back, middle, and front layers of the blanket together in preparation to sew (quilt) the whole thing together. “Back” meaning the solid colored layer of the underside of the blanket, “middle” meaning the batting/fluffy stuff inside, and “front” meaning the colorful top. The “front” of my Baby Bee Quilt is picture in a previous blog here.

My mother taught me (as her mother taught her) to use safety pins when basting quilts. They hold the layers together nicely so nothing moves around or gets accidentally folded while quilting with a machine. Since my mother and grandmothers always used safety pins, I never really searched for an alternative method. But then I found adhesive spray….and it changed everything!

The spray was so easy to use I will most likely NEVER go back to safety pins!! Which is sad, because now I have a container full of pins and no use for them. But anyway, the spray was amazing. It only took about 2 minutes to baste the entire quilt. Whereas with safety pins, it would take almost an entire afternoon pinning all those pins. Not to mention the fact that now that I’m finished quilting the blanket, I don’t have to go back and take out all the pins! No tiny holes, no punctured fingers, no bursts of anger when the pins get in the way of the sewing machine. Just plain awesome!!

For those of you who haven’t tried adhesive spray….DO IT! I bought one can of spray for my 32 x 45 baby quilt, and still have some left over for another project! 

The one thing I do advise is make sure to quickly smooth out any wrinkles when laying down your fabric onto the batting. The adhesive will stick to your fabric quickly, so you don’t have much time to get rid of wrinkles. I would also imagine that if you tried to lift the fabric from the batting once it was already covered in adhesive, it would be a sticky mess! If you have any trouble let me know!