fayeberry

I do it like hopetoquilt - put quilt on floor and cutting mat underneath. I find when I stand up I can easily see where the quilt needs to be trimmed or squared a bit. Am cautious with trimming, you can't put it back! and I always leave 1/4 extra batting to fill binding.

bibi

Very pretty quilt.

Peckish

I'm curious - for those of you who don't trim until after you attach the binding, how do you ensure the binding goes on square?

nancyw

I sqaure up my quilts before they are quilted. After the quilting is finished I trim to within an inch of the top so the feed dogs have something to grab hold of while I am sewing on the binding. After the binding is on I trim to between an eighth and a fourth from the top so there is something to fill out the binding when I turn it to the back.

sherrilynn13

Thanks for the help! Got them all trimmed and ready for binding

MadQuilter

I usually sew a basting stitch all the way around the very edge of the quilt to keep the border edges in place. That makes it easier for me to square it up. I use a large 15" square ruler and the long 6x24" ruler to align along the edges (starting in a corner). I use a large table and push the cutting board along the side I am trimming. Usually there is a specific line in the quilt pattern (or border) that I use to align my template. Most of the time I do a dry run with the template all the way around the quilt to make sure nothing is too wonky. Not sure if this helps. Good luck.

Oops, didn't read that you already figured it out. Good for you!

misskira

I used pinking shears on my last quilt and loved the results. I didn't have borders so I just trimmed around the top.

Peckish

So, you don't worry about if or how much the quilting throws the quilt out of square?

Maybe I'm just too particular about the details. I wait until the quilt is quilted, then I square it up, then I sew the binding on, then I block it.

quiltbabe

Laying out the quilt top for basting usually lets me know where it all went wrong! Like this last quilt I'm now quilting. Somehow I had the borders way off. That doesn't happen too often, thankfully. Fixed it so it was nice and flat and square before basting. So I guess you could say I square up before quilting. Then after quilting, I use my rulers to make sure the corners and sides are nice and straight and square. As you know, sometimes quilting gets it out of line, stretches a little here and there. So with my rulers, I find the square corners, straight edges and mark it with a pencil. The pencil line is like your cut line, but, like nancyw in her comment, having the extra batting and backing gives the feed dogs something to hold on to and completely fills the binding all around the quilt. Before I did it this way, despite all my efforts, sometimes there would be less full areas of my binding. After sewing the binding on, I use my ruler/rotary cutter to cut the excess batting and backing off, which goes straight to my stash! On a side note, if my quilting design doesn't go off the edges, I baste the edges to hold them securely for the binding. Thankfully, there are no quilt police to judge us! Or I would get busted alot!