Hello friends of Craft Apple! It’s Joanna here, from Stardust Shoes. In the interest of keeping Linda’s blog crafty while she’s away from her beloved sewing machine, she’s asked me to guest blog. Wow, I don’t know what to say. I’m so honored! I’ve never guested on someone’s blog before, let alone someone I have so much history with. Let’s see…what silly big-haired picture of her can I post here? Ha ha! I’ll get back to you with one.
Alrighty, then. Here’s a crafty trick I recently learned: the ladder stitch. I first came across it when I was learning about the mattress stitch in knitting. The ladder stitch is fabulous for sewing up softies. I decided to try it for binding a quilt. Looky here over my shoulder:
A. Sew the binding to the front by machine as usual.
B. Insert the thread so that the knot will be hidden on the underside of the binding. Make sure the thread exits through the crease.
C. Sorry I couldn’t hold the binding down, sew, and take a picture all at the same time. Hold (or clip—that’d be smart) down the binding so that the exit point in the crease is lined up with the entry point for your next stitch.
D. Continue with the next stitch.
1. the thread exits the crease,
2. enters the quilt,
3. exits the quilt,
4. enters the crease,
5. and exits the crease again.
Here’s the picture again without all the graffiti:
E. Carry on in this way for a bit.
F. This is what the stitches look like when they’re loose. See how they’re all nicely lined up?
G. And when pulled tight—hey, where’d they go? It’s magical how they disappear like that. No tell-tale tiny stitches to show that this was sewn by hand. And no distortion in the fabric since they are all nicely lined up.
H. Here’s the front of the quilt that was machine stitched.
Why, I dare say, the back and front look about the same. If you need to see more, here’s a great video clip of the ladder stitch.
Happy stitches to you… over and out!
Huge thanks to Joanna for guest blogging! I’m missing my machine, but only a little bit. 
It feels so good to be in vacation mode! Did I mention that Cindy is holding the shop together while I’m gone? Craft Apple is in such good hands! Stay tuned for a couple more crafty bloggers in the next couple of weeks!
Great tip! I’m going to do this on my next quilt binding. Thank you!
I’ll definitely be giving that one a try.
Thanks!!
Andi
I’m so glad I read this! I’m getting ready to bind my quilt, and I’ve never hand-stitched it before, so I was getting very nervous as to how to do it, and this tutorial was perfect!
loved this tutorial! i’ve always strayed away from binding quilts and now i’m ready to face it head on!
nice tute! I say to myself, a stich in the pink, a stitch in the blue, a stich in the pink……… happy weekend!
LOVE THIS!! I will definetly be using it. Thanks!!
Great tutorial – thanks Miss Jo! =)
Thanks for the great tip Joanna! Getting ready to bind my first quilt – guess what I’m going to do?
Thanks so much for the tutorial. I was just reading yesterday about the ladder stitch and how great it is to use when binding, but it didnt go in depth on how to actually do the stitch. Thanks for explaining it! I cant wait to try it!
Wow, this is great and so well explained! I loved your post! I’ll be linking.
Oh! I’ve been using that stitch for so many thing and never knew that it was an actual stitch with an actual name! Thanks for the great illustrations!
Thanks so much. I hate my stitches showing when I bind. Great idea.
Thank you, thank you!! I will be using this technique, I just know it!
It’s great to see a detailed visual of exactly the thing you’ve been doing “blindly” for quite some time! Thanks for the tutorial, it’s a great reinforcement.
Thank you so much for this tutorial! I have been searching the web for binding instruction, but most just tell you what type of stitch to use but not how to do it! You have just may my life alot easier!
This was a great tutorial…I am in the process of doing my first binding, I just couldn’t figure out how to get the back side to look right. This is perfect!
I first read this a week ago in the middle of sewing my binding on my first quilt. I definitely wasn’t doing the hand-sewing right, but once I read this, I totally understood what I was supposed to be doing! Thanks for the great tutorial! This was very easy to understand and see what is going on.
Great stitch im definately using this!!!