Polyester thread for hand applique?

Well, I say yes!  I was quickly running out of my favourite colour of Aurifil thread – a green/grey/brown colour that happily went with just all my greens.  I went to Tristan B.C. and discovered that they were no longer selling Aurifil, and that they only had a mixed bag on clearance.  Sad face, as my teenage daughter would say.

The great thing about buying my quilting supplies on the internet is finding terrific stores that meet most of my needs, have reasonable shipping costs and good prices.  Sew Thankful is where I buy most of my thread, and they don’t carry Aurifil.    The not so great part of internet shopping is finding those stores, so you aren’t buying one thing here, one thing there, and spending lots of dollars on shipping. Well hours wasted on google just showed me that I would have to invest a minimum of $3.00 a spool for the correct weight (60 or 50 wt., 2 ply) cotton thread that I like to do applique.  But applique doesn’t need a whole spool of thread – a spool could last a year!  Then I spent more time investigating silk thread – but again the $ outlay was more than I wanted to spend to try something. 

I then discovered Masterpiece Superior  Bottom Line polyester thread pre-filled bobbins, 60 wt 2 ply.  Lots of pretty colours!  Very reasonable price!  And I had some at home to try – I have two light neutral spools that I often use when free motioning, and for machine applique.

I appliqued the leaf on the left (with the pin in it) with the cream coloured poly thread and you cannot see the stitches.  What’s more, the thread is easier to thread on the needle, and seems less prone to tangling and shredding.  And, unlike the polyester thread of years gone by, it is not really “hard” or “springy” – I can easily snap/break a piece just as easily as cotton thread.