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Are you a traveling quilter? Do you find it hard to quilt regularly while also traveling from place to place? I think we can all agree that quilting isn’t the most portable hobby or activity. Quilting requires a wide array of tools and supplies, such as pins, needles, rotary cutters, fabrics, Pre-Cut Squares, cutting boards, rulers, machine quilting rulers, and so much more. It may seem impractical to carry such items when you’re traveling.
However, you can be a successful traveling quilter if you’re prepared. Sure, you have to be a little more frugal with quilting, but it’s possible. You must learn to identify the core or essential quilting tools for your specific needs. You may also want to invest in some portable traveling bags. If you make such preparations, you can be a successful traveling quilter.
In this article, we give you an overview of some of the best tools and supplies for traveling quilters.
11 BEST TOOLS AND SUPPLIES FOR TRAVELING QUILTERS REVIEWS
Best Quilting Fabric Strips for Traveling Quilters
First and foremost, all quilters — whether they’re traveling or stationary — need quilting fabric. Whether you purchase fabric for a specific pattern or use them as a base upon which to exert your creations, everyone needs a set of quilting fabrics.
When quilting at home, you can be as extravagant as you want. Go ahead and maintain a closet with a rainbow of fabrics. But when traveling, you must be a little more frugal. You must carefully assess your needs and carry fabrics that you need for your ongoing projects.
Connecting Threads Blender Collection is one of the best collections of fabric strips to carry while traveling. Known as Mirage Tonal, this set of fabric strips is a playful and innovative take on fabric basics.
They provide 40 fabric strips, each measuring 2.5″ x 44”. Furthermore, you get 40 different shades of fabrics, covering a wide rainbow of colors. As such, if you carry this fabric set, you don’t need any other fabrics. All of the fabrics in this set are 100% cotton and made from LUXE base cloth — one of the purest cotton materials.
Best Pre-Cut Squares for Traveling Quilters
Fabric strips are perfect if you prefer a blank slate to work with. Fabric strips are large pieces of fabric that you can cut, mold, and embroider to your heart’s content. However, if you prefer something requiring less effort, you can also go for pre-cut squares for quilting.
Pre-cut quilting squares are pre-designed and embroidered pieces of fabric, allowing you to quickly put together a patchwork quilt. Travelers should get a set of pre-cut fabrics that have a similar aesthetic sensibility.
Santee Beige Gold Blender Collection is one of the best sets of pre-cut quilting squares available. The entire collection features 40 5” pre-cut squares, each of them in a beige-gold aesthetic. If the color palette suits your project, you should purchase this collection because they’re elegant and highly malleable.
The high-grade material is also perfect for cutting and folding. While this particular set has various styles and shades of beige and gold, you can also find pre-cut quilting sets with other shades and patterns, such as blue, green, etc. You should find the set of pre-cut quilting squares most suitable for your project.
Best Thread Spools for Traveling Quilters
It goes without saying that you must get some of the best threads for quilting, whether you’re at home or traveling. There is a wide range of threads for you to choose from. You must avoid bargain threads and find high-quality threads, even if they’re more expensive.
You may wonder what’s the difference. Since threads hold the components of your quilt together, they’re the foundation and structure of the quilt. As such, weak threads may easily unravel. You may also find threads that leave lint, which can get on your clothes and be a mess. As a general rule, please go for thread spools with a lower weight number. In threads, lower weight number relates to thicker threads.
Simthread 63 Brother Colors is one of the best collections of high-quality threads. This collection features 63 spools of 40-weight threads, each measuring 550 yards. As such, these threads will last for a long time, and you have a wide range of colors.
Simthread spools are made of 100% tribal polyester yarn, which uses a 2nd generation advanced technology to produce threads with high tenacity, strength, sheen, and color depth. Furthermore, the thread spools for traveling can also withstand laundering, bleaching, and washing, without fading.
Best Rotary Cutters for Traveling Quilters
Rotary cutters and scissors are the most essential cutting tools for quilting. Rotary cutters are arguably better suited for quilting because they can easily run through all kinds of fabric, including leather and foam.
Scissors aren’t specifically designed for quilting purposes, but you may need them to snip off excess fabric and threads. You must find travel-friendly scissors and high-quality rotary cutters that don’t dull with age.
OLFA RTY-2DX PBL Rotary Cutter, Pacific Blue is one of the best rotary cutters for quilting because it’s extremely durable, strong, and suitable for multiple purposes. This rotary cutter can easily slice through up toss layers of fabric at once. It can cut through 8 layers of cotton fabric at once. It also includes a dual-action safety lock to prevent accidents. Armed with a tungsten steel 45mm rotary blade, it’s suitable for various actions. Olfa rotary cutter also comes with an ergonomic handle, suitable for those who may suffer from arthritis.
Best Scissors for Traveling Quilters
You don’t need to be as careful while selecting scissors, but you should still get a pair of durable scissors with ergonomic handles. We recommend BambooMN Titanium Softgrip Scissors — they’re sharp and feature soft-grip handles.
Best Quilting Rulers for Traveling Quilters
Quilting requires a high degree of precision. You need to set clear boundaries, establish symmetry, and stitch unique patterns in perfect proportion to different elements of your work. That’s why you must get some of the best quilting rulers for traveling. Without quilting rulers, your quilting efforts will be chaotic, to say the least.
Furthermore, you should focus on two types of quilting rulers — regular quilting rulers and machine quilting rulers. Regular quilting rulers allow you to take accurate measurements and ensure symmetry. However, machine quilting rulers guide you during the machine quilting process to draw unique embroidered shapes and patterns.
When quilting from home, you have the luxury to get a wide array of quilting rulers with different measurements, densities, and patterns. However, you must be frugal while traveling. As such, you should find quilting rulers that can serve multiple purposes, especially when considering machine quilting rulers.
Creative Grids Machine Quilting Tool Ruler Sid is one of the best machine quilting rulers, measuring 4.5″ x 6”, with a corresponding 1/4” thickness. This is one of the best multi-purpose machine quilting rulers because it features both straight and curved sides.
Dritz Quilt 101 is one of the best traditional quilting rulers, measuring 6” x 18”. Made of heavy acrylic, this ruler is suitable for sewing, quilting, and paper crafting. This quilting ruler also features numbers, angles, and diagonal lines, allowing you to make accurate triangle cuts. It can be used with rotary cutters and straight blades to ensure accuracy and symmetry.
You may use the long straight edge with needle stops to ensure optimal spacing between your designs. However, you can also use the curved and pointed sides to design flower petals, circles, and other patterns. The ruler also clings to the quilt’s fabric to prevent it from slipping while quilting.
Best Cutting Mats for Traveling Quilters
Cutting mats are yet another crucial tool for quilters. You must get self-healing cutting mats that withstand your rotary cutters and bear measurements and markings to aid in the quilting process. Cutting mats come in various sizes — small and large.
You may instinctively veer towards small cutting mats for traveling. However, we recommend getting large folding mats because they can be folded down to a compact size and later unfolded to meet all your quilting needs.
Olfa Folding Cutting Mat is one of the best folding mats for traveling quilters for two reasons. First, it’s a large 17” x 24” folding mat, allowing you to work on large quilts. Second, it’s a foldable cutting mat, allowing you to fold it into a compact size suitable for traveling purposes. In addition to that, it also bears other features of cutting mats, i.e., self-healing, measurements, and rotational.
Best Quilting Pins for Traveling Quilters
Quilting pins, clips, and needles are also crucial components of quilting. However, pins and needles mostly serve functional purposes, i.e., appliqué work, basting, holding fabric together, etc. As such, people often gloss over their importance and purchase sub-standard pins. However, you must be careful while getting pins and needles for quilting.
Ideally, you should get quilting pins with colorful heads, allowing you to see them if they fall down on the floor. You should also get flat-headed pins because you can place a ruler over them. Since you’re traveling, you should get a small collection of high-quality quilting pins and needles.
Juvale Sewing Pins are some of the best quilting pins for all quilters, regardless of whether they’re traveling. A single reasonable set of quilting pins includes 475 pins in 5 clear boxes. Furthermore, the pins feature brightly-colored flat-heads designs like buttons, bows, and butterflies. As such, you’re sure to identify them if they fall down. These quilting pins and needles measure 1.6” to 2” in length.
Best Quilting Clips for Traveling Quilters
Morsler Sewing Clips is one of the best collections of sewing clips for quilting, crafting, and knitting purposes. This collection features 100 multicolor sewing clips, each of them wide enough to hold multiple layers of quilting fabrics together. Furthermore, these sewing clips don’t leave a mark on the quilt.
Best Portable Sewing Machine for Traveling Quilters
If you’re like most people, you probably believe there’s no way you can carry a sewing machine while traveling. Most modern sewing machines are large and bulky, making them impossible to carry. However, you can also get some great portable sewing machines. While they won’t be as convenient as large sewing machines with attached boards, they’ll get the job done.
WAQIA Oh Mini is one of the cheapest and most reasonable portable sewing machines. This sewing machine only measures 8.27” x 7.68” x 3.54”, weighing around 2.2 pounds. It also comes with dual-speed adjustment and two power-modes. You can use it with batteries or connect it to a power source. Furthermore, it also includes an LED light to help you quilt in low lighting.
Best Portable Sewing Kits for Travelers
Last, but far from the least, you must get portable sewing kits for travelers. In fact, unless you want to put your sewing station together yourself, you can get a portable sewing kit that meets all of your needs.
Most portable sewing kits include all the essentials of quilting, including threads, scissors, pins, needles, and other tools. You may have to get the sewing machine and fabrics separately — but the sewing kit will certainly make the entire station so much more portable.
Coquimbo Sewing Kit for Traveler is one of the best sewing kits for travelers because it’s a large zipper-locked bag with elastic straps to hold all your sewing notions. The entire sewing bag measures 7.2 x 5.1 x 1.2 inches, and weighs 5.6 ounces, making it extremely portable.
This sewing bag includes the following items — needles, threads, scissors, buttons, thimble, threader tools, and seam ripper. Furthermore, it includes 40 thread spools in 20 different shades. As such, if you get this sewing kit, you won’t have to separately identify sewing and quilting essentials.
Wrapping Up!
We hope this article on the best tools and supplies for traveling quilters has shown you how you can merge traveling and quilting. You don’t have to choose one or the other. Your passion for quilting can go wherever you go. All you have to do is judiciously identify the best tools for traveling quilters!
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