Some machines have even feed feet that work better than others. Both of my Brother's will pull a little bit extra on the bottom if I don't hold them together snugly. And by a little bit, on a 4 inch seam, I will lose a 16th of an inch. Not much, but to me it makes a difference when I am trying to keep everything square. I watched Jordan of Jordan's fabrics sew on a commercial Consew and her machine pulls fabric through beautifully. Some of the Pfaff's have even feed feet. I haven't used one so don't know if they are really better or not. Oddly, when paper piecing, the seams will stay even without me holding them snugly. I have to believe it is because the paper by itself will never give any, whereas fabric will.
For borders, I pin, pin, pin. I mark and pin the top and the bottom and then at the center point, at the 1/4 point on each side of the center and still hold my material snugly. I add pins if I have more than a foot between pins. I have had only 1 wiggly border when doing this and I believe it was because I cut my border on WOF which gives it more pull/stretchiness. I have learned to cut my border material first along the selvedge edge so that the borders don't have any stretchiness in them. If my blocks seem to be stretchy, I will staystitch the enter border edge before adding the final border.
Last edited by Barb in Louisiana; 06-12-2018 at 04:59 PM.