When I took my first quilt class about 9 years ago, I was taught to layer my quilt then use safety pins about a hand's width apart over the whole quilt. This process is so tedious, hard to crawl around on the floor or lean over a table. On smaller wall hanging or table runners I have used the spray adhesive. What do you folks use?.... :roll: Here is one ready to put in the pins. Back breaking.

First let me tell you that this quilt is gorgeous!!! I am a new and self-taught quilter. I read books and looked at on-line tutorials and most have done the pinning method. I pin most of my quilts. I have bought two types of adhesive, 505 and June Taylor (not sure if correct name). The 505 was great-no odor at all but very expensive. The other spray (comes in a pink can) worked great but has a horrible odor that lingered in my quilts, even after washing.

I am going to get a pair of knee protectors to protect my poor knees when I pin baste on the floor.

SherriB, Thanks, That picture was taken a while ago. I hand quilted that red and white quilt. I'm not sure why, the fabric is so busy you cant really see the quilting, but I know it's there. The knee protectors are a good idea, now I guess a back brace is in order also. I used the 505 on my small quilts, I even used it on a lap quilt, but even that was crawling around on the floor to smooth it from the center and get all the wrinkles out. That is why I asked this question, to see if there were any other great ideas out there.

What a beautiful quilt. I use basting spray on all my quilts. Wall hangings to king size.

I put my large size quilts in a three pole no basting frame and hand baste it that way. Check out Sharon Schamber's sit a chair and baste using baseboards. It's the best way if you don't have a basting frame or a Long Armer to baste it for you.

I pin mine on my cutting table, but its height is 38-1/2" from the floor, so not much bending for me to do. I do one section (length and width of table size) at a time after the 3 layers are smoothed and clamped (with large 2" wide clips from an office supply store) to the table edges. The "table" is a sheet of plywood. I can pin from both ends and both sides of the table, so I don't have to reach/stretch too far. Once a section is done, than I remove the clips and repeat the process with another section of the quilt layers. It's a bit of a pain in the rear, but I've tried other methods and I like them even less.

For machine embroidery, I wouldn't have to pin at all if I would just practice at my Grace aluminum frame with the machine that is set up on it and get fairly good at it. I don't expect excellence, but right now all I can do is make a big fat mess. The quilt frame practice always gets shoved to the back burner and I never get any done.

I use safety pins on my Art quilts. I also discovered the Kwik Klip tool. It's a marvelous tool for fastening or unfastening safety pins. You do need to have a hard surface underneath, though. No more sore fingers from closing so many pins.

I pin mine, but I am lucky to have big tables at church and ladies who are eager to help get it done.

I safety pin mine as well. I have two tables pushed together in my sewing room so that the overall surface area is 6' x 5', so I just layer them there and then pin them. For some they will overflow off the table, so I just pin one side and then slide it all to the other direction and then pin the other side.

I do mine like Weezie. Harriet Hargrave has a book that shows you how to do this. "Heirloom Machine Quilting" It's a wonderful book, full of lots of good info.