At any rate, I thought I’d pass along this opinion here, just in case anyone wonders what the options are.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Anyone who does machine quilting on a domestic machine for any length of time knows the value of having a silicon sheet for the bed of the machine. That silicon sheet allows the quilt sandwich to slide easily, reducing drag and reducing strain on the quilter’s shoulders and arms. It’s a no-brainer. There are two […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[299],"tags":[202,49,2,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-3198","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-quilting","7":"tag-bernina","8":"tag-notions","9":"tag-quilting","10":"tag-machine","11":"czr-hentry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5yzuO-PA","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1279,"url":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/2014\/07\/19\/a-place-for-everything\/","url_meta":{"origin":3198,"position":0},"title":"A Place for Everything","author":"Sandy","date":"July 19, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Remember this bag\u00a0from about a year ago? I used it to take some quilting notions with me on the recent quilting cruise, and I've also used it for more local quilting events. However, it is limited in the size of things it will accommodate, so I decided to make its\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Quilting"","block_context":{"text":"Quilting","link":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/category\/quilting\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/IMG_1281.jpg?fit=731%2C900&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/IMG_1281.jpg?fit=731%2C900&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/IMG_1281.jpg?fit=731%2C900&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/IMG_1281.jpg?fit=731%2C900&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3205,"url":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/2017\/09\/10\/a-new-tote\/","url_meta":{"origin":3198,"position":1},"title":"A new tote","author":"Sandy","date":"September 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Last October one of my cousins was visiting Las Vegas during a tour she took; she lives in England, so this was a wonderful chance to get together, if only briefly. :) Andrea brought me a lovely grouping of fabrics and a pattern for a tote bag. I had to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Quilting"","block_context":{"text":"Quilting","link":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/category\/quilting\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/IMG_2749-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3025,"url":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/2017\/05\/19\/machine-quilting-practice-installment-three\/","url_meta":{"origin":3198,"position":2},"title":"Machine quilting practice, installment three","author":"Sandy","date":"May 19, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"I've skipped posting a few \"installments\" here on the practice piece I began here and continued here. Between those two installments and now, I added about a zillion \"pebbles\" around the flying geese, as well as two sections with curved feathers. The latest task, which I did today, was to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Free motion quilting"","block_context":{"text":"Free motion quilting","link":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/category\/quilting\/free-motion\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/silk100wt.jpg?fit=640%2C364&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/silk100wt.jpg?fit=640%2C364&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/silk100wt.jpg?fit=640%2C364&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3063,"url":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/2017\/06\/07\/machine-quilting-practice-part-4\/","url_meta":{"origin":3198,"position":3},"title":"Machine quilting practice, part 4","author":"Sandy","date":"June 7, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"This is the latest installment of the Lucy's Nickels project I've been doing. This time we were supposed to do swirls that overlapped to make a sort of curved crosshatching pattern. While it was fun to do, I suspect it would be more effective if I'd done more overlaps. We're\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Free motion quilting"","block_context":{"text":"Free motion quilting","link":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/category\/quilting\/free-motion\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/IMG_2282-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2981,"url":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/2017\/03\/10\/machine-quilting-practice-installment-two\/","url_meta":{"origin":3198,"position":4},"title":"Machine quilting practice, installment two","author":"Sandy","date":"March 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Actually, this is probably installment four, since the first step in this online project was to trace the main parts of the design and sandwich the little quilt. The second was to quilt along the wavy lines and then quilt flying geese inside those. The third step was\u00a0to draw three\u00a0large\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Free motion quilting"","block_context":{"text":"Free motion quilting","link":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/category\/quilting\/free-motion\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/IMG_2147-300x230.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2967,"url":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/2017\/02\/23\/machine-quilting-practice\/","url_meta":{"origin":3198,"position":5},"title":"Machine quilting practice","author":"Sandy","date":"February 23, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Not too long ago I found out about a challenge sponsored by Teri Lucas on her Facebook page. It's a slow challenge, with the steps\u00a0\u2014\u00a0two so far\u00a0\u2014\u00a0coming every few weeks. The challenge is intended to give the participants some practice in free-motion quilting, and so far it's been fun. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Free motion quilting"","block_context":{"text":"Free motion quilting","link":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/category\/quilting\/free-motion\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/IMG_2136-300x235.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3198"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3198\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3203,"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3198\/revisions\/3203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sandymike.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/IMG_2748-300x225.jpg?resize=300%2C225\")
<\/a>I prefer the “other” brand: the Sew Slip, specifically the generously-sized\u00a0Sew Slip 2<\/a> with rectangular hole, pictured here. Why does the hole make a difference, you ask? The answer lies in versatility. I usually use my walking foot to do stabilizing stitching on my quilts before beginning the much more fun free-motion work. I can still have the benefits of the silicon sheet *and* use the feed dogs (necessary with the walking foot) with this version. In addition, I have on occasion needed to stitch vinyl or other “sticky” fabrics, and this — coupled with a silicon presser foot on my machine — means I can stitch these items with ease. Yes, some people use tissue paper or other workarounds instead, but I’ve been known to stitch right through the tissue paper and then have to spend time with tweezers to get it out of the stitches. YMMV. \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n