What I didn’t tell you much about was that between the time I came back to Poland the week before Thanksgiving and the day before Thanksgiving, I had purchased a whole bolt of batting. That’s 50 meters (a little more than 50 yards).

We were expecting company that Wednesday, so I knew I had to finish up the batting, or at least use most of it so that I could find a place to store it.

Here I’ve got a picture taken back in ‘15 of a roll of batting which takes up most of the living room. There’s a quilt and a cat on it, BTW.

Both the room that I normally used to store stuff and the room I keep my tops in until I work on them were going to be used for company.

So, I decided to get busy and get a bunch of my tops put together. I had to prepare backings and then get them sandwiched.

I did manage to completely use up the 50 meter roll of batting in that period of time.

Most of the quilt tops were large, though, so I didn’t have to do a ton of them. It was during that time that I finished up the I Spy Quilt and Lacy Chains and I’ve managed to finish quilting Palace Tile as well - though it’s not bound yet.

So now I have a bunch more ready to quilt. A huge pile of them! These are the 10 I still have yet to quilt or finish quilting.

I was able to get 12 queen size quilts out of the roll of batting and a small one - the I Spy Snowball Quilt. So, I got a total of 13 quilts out of my 50 meter roll of poly batting.

I know recently that poly batting has been getting a lot of bad press on different Facebook groups.

One lady mentioned that the reason I hadn’t had any bearding issues was because the 13 year old rag quilts I have just haven’t started doing it yet - but if I had been quilting as long as she had, then no doubt, I would have those problems as well.

I have no idea.

I can’t say “what if” when I simply don’t know.

I do know that if my 13 year old quilts start shedding poly batting that they will become hubby quilts and he can use them for his mechanic work - or make their way to the garage for keeping cars and engines warm.

I guess you can’t see me shrugging my shoulders. I’m certainly not that upset about a hypothetical. I have a lot more important things going on in my life than a quilt batting potentially bearding through and showing after over 10 years of use.

If they did start doing it to a quilt I gifted, it would give me a reason to make that person another quilt. That’s not a big deal in my book.

I really don’t see it as an issue if a 20+year old quilt begins to have problems. How long do I expect any item made of textiles to last? How old is the oldest item of clothing in your closet? (Item that you regularly wear/use) Eventually all textiles wear out. That’s the nature of fiber.

All in all, I simply believe people’s very strong opinions about using or not using types of batting exist simply because the typical American (that’s usually who is vocalizing such opinions) has choices.

Many choices in fact.

Possibly all are affordable.

It is not necessarily that way around the world. When you have only one affordable choice - you use it. It’s really that simple.

If the other choices represent 1/10 of your salary, you just don’t opt for them. Cotton batting here in Poland seems to be quite expensive and not very easy to find. The typical Polish person’s salary isn’t that big.

Anyway…off my soapbox now.

Wait. I figure that at $39 for the 50 meters of poly batting, I spent an average of $3 per quilt for the batting. That’s for 13 quilts - 12 of which were queen size. I can afford that. I’ll bet most of you could too!

Cotton batting, however, here in Poland would cost me over $50 per quilt - so for the same 13 quilts (skip the small one - we’ll use 12 quilts) - it would have been $600 for the batting.

I’ll learn to use poly and be grateful for it!

But, I think I mentioned that my two large Janome sewing machines are both being sent back to the shop for repairs. I sent them out on Monday. I don’t know when they will come back - but I’m hoping before Christmas. I know that they have to wait their turn at the repair shop. I guess we’ll see how involved that is.

Because I packed them both up, I’m not going to be quilting on all those sandwiched quilts until I get at least one of them back from the repair shop. Hopefully it won’t take them too long. I also hope it doesn’t cost too much! :)

I often buy something else just to include when they send me a machine back (I’ve done this more than once though this is the first time I’ve sent both big machines back at the same time.) This time the only thing I really need is another mat or two. I have plenty of bobbins, needles, blades, etc. I can’t actually think of anything else to order!

I’ll let you know how much it costs me. I had to send them all the way across the country of Poland to over close to the German border. I use the website eti.com.pl as my main place to buy supplies and machines now. They are the official Janome distributor here in Poland

Oh well. Such is life. I can’t do anything about it and it’s not like I can’t sew. I still have my Janome 1600 QCP mechanical machine which sews like a dream. I’ve been itching to do some real sewing, anyway, so hopefully I can do that this week as well as construct backings I will need for the next quilt tops I want to finish. I don’t really enjoy making the backings, so getting those out of the way will be helpful!

And that’s what’s been happening in my world - at least with regards to quilting!

Have a great day, wherever you are reading this!

Be sure to check out what my sis has for you in the store! She’s keeping busy putting up stock - she’s got all those bolts and bolts of things we bought that arrived earlier this month!

Sandwiching quilts