Hey Everyone, welcome back to Cool Tool Thursday.

Last week when I was at Simcoe Sew & Quilt teaching my machine quilting class a couple of new tools were brought to my attention. I thought why not give them a try and highlight them on Cool Tool Thursday.

One is the Mesh Transfer Canvas by Clover which is really quite a clever idea.

Mesh Transfer Canvas by Clover

Mesh lying on top of brown fabric

The second tool is the Trace’n Mark Air Erasable Marker Pen by Clover and Nancy Zieman.

Trace ‘n Mark Air Erasable Pen

The idea with the mesh is to trace your design onto it with a pen or pencil – if you use a pencil and draw on the side of the mesh that has a matte finish then it can be erased when you are finished with it and the mesh is reusable for other projects.

One motif traced in pencil and another motif that has already been used with the marking pen

Once the motif is traced onto the mesh then it is placed on top of the area on your quilt where you want the motif to be. Using the Trace ‘n Mark pen draw over the design on the mesh again. This time the pen will transfer onto the fabric as it falls through the tiny holes of the mesh – really quite neat.

Motif transferred to fabric by drawing over design on mesh – see the holes in the mesh

The pen has a fine end and a thick end. I tried with both ends and found that the thick end made a better transfer and was easier to see on the fabric.

Fine tip on the left and thick tip on the right

Now the instructions read that the ink will disappear within 2 -14 days naturally without doing anything. Optionally you can soak with water to get rid of the lines. It is also recommend that you quilt within 2 days of marking in case the lines disappear and yes, that has happened to me on the very first quilt I made – imagine the surprise I had when I went back to quilt it and there were no lines.

I found that the fine tipped lines had already started to disappear but I also hadn’t really pressed that hard or possibly they were covered up by the stitching. I did try using water on the thicker marking lines and it worked well but I did have to get it fairly wet which is not my preference as then the three layers of the quilt are wet.

I would have to say on initial trial of these items that I do like both. I will keep working with them though and see how it goes. Update to follow later.

Here are those links again:
Trace’n Mark Air Erasable Marker Pen by Clover
Mesh Transfer Canvas by Clover
You may recognize the motif from my post the other day called Inspiration From a Piece of Paper Towel. Check out my post tomorrow to see how I quilt this motif.

Happy Quilting!

I shared this on Off The Wall Friday

Disclosure Note: I buy and use the products mentioned in this post and write about them without influence from the designer or any other commercial interests. I have included links to the products on Amazon.com and may receive a small commission if you purchase from these links. This doesn’t cost you any more to purchase these items but it does help me maintain this website, so I hope that you will please use these links.