Teddybear Lady

I had never heard the term "spider" either but I guess that's what I've always done. I sometimes use a small piece of folded batting and run it through. I too cut off the threads and reuse. I'm like QuiltE, it does look like a hairy mess with all those threads hanging off. haha

Bobbinalong

Here's a pattern that would work well with leaders and enders.

All from my scrap box.

grann of 6

For a while I was thick into the leader ender thing, and have a fair collection of them for a scrappy quilt. But then I got the new machine Aria which has a thread cutter and does a wonderful job of not eating fabric at the start, and stopped using the little scraps of fabric. I also do mostly chain piecing when making a quilt, so don't need them. I find the newer machines don't eat the fabric at the start like the older or cheaper machines do. My little Rachel machine I take to classes is notorious for eating the fabric at the start, even the first leader, so I usually have an ender under the needle waiting for the next piece of fabric.

Iceblossom

I learned spider from another similar thread on this forum about a year ago. It fits it so exactly well that I've taken up the term.

I like having a larger piece so I can visually find it, but pretty much always start with a leader. Yes, it helps keep the threads ends down and it helps start the seam especially with triangle points.

I do mostly strip piecing techniques and usually have lots of little ends from that, those get used a lot for the spiders, but usually just once or twice and then they disappear... the big ones I can find/look for.

And yes, I reuse my spiders until they are positively hairy. The current one actually got grabbed up and trimmed down recently instead of being replaced.

tuckyquilter

As a scrap quilter, I have used the Leader/Ender way to make other quilts. L/E are, to me anyway, pieces of a new quilt. My scraps are cut to sizes I use right away so I have bins ready to use. I use Bonnie Hunter's method of scrap management and L/E. I've made three My Blue Heaven, one with Christmas fabric (free pattern on her blog) from L/E and I also make a steady stream of 4-patches in several sizes, HST with light on one side, dark on the other that I use in Split 9-patch blocks or to make borders etc. I keep things in those 15x15x3 bins so I can just grab something to use a my L/E. Many of the quilts in my Quilt Album are made using L/E

https://quiltville.blogspot.com/2005...ue-heaven.html

Split 9-Patch
http://quiltville.com/pdf/Split9Patch.pdf