1. quilting thread
2. perle cotton size 8
3. 3-strand embroidery floss
4. 6-strands embroidery floss
5. stem stitch with perle size 8
6. stem stitch with 6-strand floss
Both
embroidery floss and perle cotton give you a showy stitch when you
quilt with them. Embroidery floss has the advantage of easy
availability and a wider variety of colors. The disadvantage is that it
is 6-ply: there are six different threads wrapped together. It makes it
harder to thread the needle and maybe I'm the only hopeless one here,
but I seem to get loops in one of the little threads and so it pulls
funny and unevenly from the others.
I
love to quilt with perle cotton (aka pearl cotton) size 8.
The perle cotton is indistinguishable from the look of 3-strands of
floss when quilted. It comes in
balls (not skeins) and you can usually find black, white, ecru, and red
fairly easily; other colors are available online or at specialty shops.
This is the back of one of my quilts done with the perle cotton. I
leave the knots on the back--I would hate to try and pull it thru the
fabric--which makes it look interesting. You can see how much thicker
the perle is than the quilting thread.
I
included the stem stitch just so you could how that compares. Sometimes
this bold stitch is just what you need to make something noticeable and
yes, you can do it through all three layers. Here is a quick look at
how to make it:
It's a two steps
forward, one step back kind of stitch.
