Have you ever made a quilt, quilted it up, and just don’t understand why your piecing doesn’t pop like the ones you see at quilt shows?

You might even be doing a sew along with the exact same pattern as the creator and it just still isn’t the same.

It might be because you are forgetting to stitch in the ditch!

What is stitch in the ditch?

Stitching in the ditch is a quilting technique where you quilt right in the seam (or in the ditch) of the piecing. 

Typically in this quilting technique the goal is to not see the quilting. By stitching in the ditch, the quilting basically falls between the folds of the fabric and is barely visible.

This technique is commonly used by quilters to avoid breaking thread between sections of quilting to travel to different locations in the quilt. 

Since the stitching falls in the seams, it becomes invisible and allows you to move around a quilt much easier. 

So why use this as a quilting technique?

It’s not just used to travel throughout the quilt. 

There’s a method to the madness.

By using stitch in the ditch, you are essentially quilting a border around the patch that you are stitching around. 

With a defined border, your piecing is given definition and really pops against the background of the quilt. 

Without using this technique, the only definition to your quilt is in the piecing, but you don’t get the definition in the texture.

Without this definition, your quilting tends to look muddy and your custom quilting does not give the same effect. 

So even though you don’t actually see this quilting from the front of the quilt, the texture it provides makes a very noticeable difference in your quilt.

So how do I stitch in the ditch?

You can do this in any format that you happen to be quilting in, with a walking foot or free motion foot. 

But, whenever possible, I prefer to use my walking foot.

Don’t have a walking foot yet? Here’s a link to a the one I use.

A walking foot does all the work for you, and a free motion foot takes a bit of getting used to as well as a lot of attention to detail.

The key is to go a bit slower when you are quilting to make sure every stitch really ends up in the seam. 

But if it’s not perfect it’s by no means going to ruin the quilt. 

This really isn’t any more difficult than just sewing in a line, it just takes a little more attention to detail to make sure your stitches are staying in the seam line.

So Try it out! 

Time to try it out and see if it makes the difference you are looking for in your quilting!