Basting not going well
 

I have to baste on my cutting table. There is no other space in the house for me to do it. And crawling around on the concrete in the driveway just isn't an option . I have basted this quilt twice. Once with thread , I tore that out and the second time with pins being much more careful to clip the backing to the table and pin closely. I folded it over today to take it to the machine and sigh,,, Not smooth. I just know this is going to get little folds everywhere if I try to stitch it this way. Soo I guess I have to take it out and try again.I spent way too much money and time with this top. Just not now I guess. I am so discouraged tired and sore and I am about in tears.
And yes I would like a sharp cheddar or havarti to go with the whine please. :)
OH I did use basting spray on most of it but ran out . Even the part with the spray is making hills.

Do you have a suitable wall space to use, even just temporarily? I just glue basted a 70" x 85" quilt this way earlier this week. It is about 60% quilted and I have had absolutely no issues with hills/pleats/tucks/wrinkles... anything. Sorry you are having such a horrid time, I've been there many times myself and it is truly discouraging.

So sorry for your difficulties. Fortunately I have 2 very large tables in the dinning/family room. Sometimes I use masking tape to tape around the edges of the backing fabric to the tables before I start to pin

have you considered using Elmers School Glue....I get my quilts as smooth as glass....it can be done....

Call the local library, community centers, and and see if the meeting room is empty. You can use the tables to baste. And the best thing is send it to a long armer to baste for you. The local LA's charge $20 to baste a queen size quilt. it depends on the batting type if it cost more.

I can no longer get myself on the floor to baste, so I bought a full sheet of interior grade plywood, used masking tape around all the edges, and just put it on the table when I have a large quilt to baste. I bought jumbo plastic clips and after pressing my lining, center it on the table (large quilts will hang over all 4 edges evenly) and clip the lining taught all the way around. The clips are strong enough to hold it, yet easy enough to re-position when needed. You can see if there are wrinkles etc and just re position the clips while lightly smoothing and pulling the lining. Once it looks smooth, add your batting the same way, then your ironed top. I put a clip every 10 inches or so, and very close to the corners. Get someone if you can to help with this, one on each side of the plywood to help keep it straight and smooth. DH usually gets sucked into this! Then, you are ready to baste, be it thread or pin, starting in the middle and working out. When it is all done, take clips off and shift carefully to a side hanging down and re-clip, doing that for all 4 sides that might hang down. I never get wrinkles or shifting doing it this way. Good luck

How big is your table? My cutting table is 60"x48" so I have no trouble basting my quilt on it with the Elmer's School Glue but I have done it on my small kitchen table which is way smaller before my hubby built my cutting table. The backing is as flat as it can possibly get, and no issues quilting. NONE! If you cannot find step by step instructions on the board PM me and I will will send it to you. All the best and good luck!

Have you tried the Sharon Schamber method? We baste a lot of quilts at guild doing it her way. We have a basting day and many bring their quilts that are physically unable or just don't like to baste and we all work basting together.

Perhaps someone could do a tutorial on how to baste using Elmer's school glue. I would be interested in that. Or is there a you tube video about it?

when basting on your cutting table have a majority of the quilt hanging over the edge this keeps the tension on your stuff and it really does work. when you get to the middle then hang the basted edge over the edge and continue.

The last quilt I spray basted had no wrinkles in it. I did it in 1/4's on my dining room table. There was no over spray and it worked great. I have also done the spray with the quilt hanging on the wall. That works great, too. I am very careful to only use a small amount of glue. Works great.
Sue

No unfortunately not in this house. Almost every wall has either a door or window or its got bookcases piled with my brothers things. I wish I had a wall to do it on

I went to the local quilt shop to see if they knew someone who would do that. She looked at me like I was nuts said she had never heard of it and it wouldn't be worth her time.

I start with the quilt centered on my table , baste the middle first then move to the middle edges and then the corners. Do you start on the edge of the quilt?

I am in a "unique" living situation. I have to live with my brother who of course has most of the house filled with his own things. I even thought about getting 2 4x8 sheets of insulatation board but I would only be able to use them once and have to toss them because with all his things there is simply no place to store them. This house is pretty full , He has 3 motorcycles , wait no 4,3 work 1 not. and 3 cars in various stages of repair. 2 sheds full of stuff and a garage that can barely be walked around in. Even the attic is pretty full , the room that is suppose to be the "formal " living room is full of computer stuff. Add in a stepdaughter that moved into his over the garage room with all her things and 3 animals and you have a pretty full house. I am glad I have a bedroom and a sewing room but both are pretty tight.. Of course there is always that glad I have a roof over my head thing. LOL

I had a quilt basted by a LAer and didn't specifiy exactly how I wanted it done as I thought she was the professional and would know better than I. When I got it back it was just sewn in horizontal rows 10 inches apart with "relaxed" fabric between the lines.

I just had to pull all the basting lines out and do it myself.

It just goes to show you need to get a clear indication of what they will do.

Now I use my narrow table and do the centre first, then each end.

Good luck with it.

I so feel your pain and frustration.....
will take the time tomorrow and do a tute on how to use Elmers School glue to baste......
it will give you the most flat, wrinkle free quilt ever............................

Basting is my achilles heel as well, and I'm just doing kids quilts! Can't imagine anything larger... I'm going to try the Elmer's School glue on my next top and would welcome a tute Deborahlees! I'm a Deborah Lynn btw.

that would be wonderful thanks

I am looking forward to seeing the Elmers Glue basting too. Was curious about how it is done.

Here's what I recently did.
Using a table approx. 4' x 5-6' I laid out the batting and clipped it down to the table with big black "bulldog" clips (from office supply store).
Using spray basting I sprayed across the width of the batting approx a 12 wide area.
I folded up the backing like the picture below, and with one person (my mom!) on one side and me on the other, we carefully placed the backing on top of the sprayed batting, just covering the sticky area and leaving the rest of the backing folded.
We smoothed that section and made sure all edges were adhered.
We sprayed another 12" section across the batting, laid the next fold of the backing on the sprayed section, smoothed it down well, spray the next section of batting, lay on the backing, smoothed it down, etc., etc.

When the batting and backing were fused together, I turned the whole unit over and folded the quilt top in the same manner.
Clamped the unit to the table.
Sprayed the batting in a 12" wide section as before, laid the top on it, smoothed it down well, and continued as before, fold by fold.

I have moved this quilt around, on and off the sewing table, under the machine needle and out again, folded it up to set the laptop on the table, unfolded it and began quilting again, and NOT A PROBLEM yet.
At all.
No puckering.
No shifting of fabric from edge to edge or side to side.
No failure of the fuse.
I am delighted with my first basting spray use in 15 years.
It's supposed to wash out when I finish the binding, let's all believe for that!

Jan in VA

This is the problem I always have with a large quilt. I ended up taking to Long arm quilter because i could not do the basting. it is a big job. I need to figure out something else also because I cannot aford to send each quilt out. Cost is too much. I feel bad for you and have been there. Even when you have a large area, then you cannot reach the middle.

I've struggled with basting in the past too. I hand basted one quilt on the floor. That was a pain, in the back and neck and knees and pretty much every where else! LOL Then I had a couple basted by a longarmer that didn't really know how to do that and that was a mess. Then I found Sharon Schamber's method and I've used that several times with good success. Now I use a hybrid method of rolling the top and back on the boards but now I spray baste the center and just pin baste down the borders. I have two of the 5 foot folding tables from Wal-Mart so they don't take up a lot of space and I have a set of 6 foot boards and a set of 10 foot boards and they store behind the sofa in the family room. When I run out of 505 I may try the Elmer's glue since I live in a small town and have to order the 505 but I can get Elmer's easy enough.

Using the board method gives you a small area to work with and it keeps your backing, batting and top all very nice and smooth.

This is the one process that seems to be most frustrating to me. Even after I've pinned, I double check to make sure the back is as smooth as the front. Sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't. So I start all over again. It's a real pain and time consuming but it pays off when I start hand quilting. I just have to remember to go slowly and be very patient with myself.

My first baby quilt I had to redo several times till I smarten up and look on the QB for guidance, I taped the bottom down to the floor to keep it straight and taut then but the batting and sray basted it to the bottom than the top. It worked out perfect. Again thank QB for all your help.

Great advise! Thanks for sharing. G

jan, you are always such a font of great advice! I had such good luck (finally) getting my seams to match with Elmer's I am looking forward to seeing the glue tutorial.

I am finally quilting my first quilt now (that's a post all by itself!), that had I hand basted on the living room floor. Even my DH said there has to be a better way. The back didn't look smooth enough to me, but it's quilting up nice and flat. The top, however...

I do mine on a table with backing clipped on the edges. I pin it in sections starting in the middle. It seems to work quite well for me, I live in an apartment and do not have any extra space for doing large auilts.

I'm so glad to hear I'm not the only one. This is the only part of quilting that I dread and always have problems with. I've been wrestling with a queen size one for months, and still need to redo it again.

I use those really large binder clips to attached and keep my backing fabric tight to the table. Then I put the batting on and do the same thing (attaching it to the table with the binding clips), and then again, with the actual quilt. I figured this out several years ago, and it works very well for me.

I bought some 2 " x 2" x 8 ' boards at Menards as well as 4 - wood working clamps. I balance the boards on four chairs and hold together at each end with the wood working clamps. I put on the back layer followed by the batting and quilt top and tack with tack pins. If you pull the layers tight it gives you an excellent surface to work with for basting and you can release each end and roll it towards the other side as you go so you can reach different areas.

Basting:
 

Go to your church and put 2 tables together, or to your local library..They should let you use a table..

Every LA I know can baste a quilt on their machine. Some don't want to as they have too many quilts to get done. but it's easy money to most. Mine does all her basting quilts in one day. Load on, fast baste, load off. For the quilt shop idiot to say she never heard of it was simply to make you feel like a fool for asking. I would never spend another penny in that shop.

Okay here is a way to get it smooth. I rolled the last quilt I basted. I rolled the top the batting and the backing separately. I then unrolled each and smoothed it as I went. I did have to redo the backing once. Only because it wrinkled a little. I have had much better luck this way then folding and smoothing. I am off to the store to get large dowels to put batting on to do the rolling method all the time! I will think about doing a tutorial on this. Luann in CT

I was having the same problems as you are. Someone on the QB suggested the Sharon Schamber method that is on Youtube. It is easy to do and solved my problem! Hope you find a way that works well for you!

This is how I do it.....I put the wrong side up of the backing, on my average size dinning room table, then put down the batting, then the top....I make sure all my edges are correct, I generally cut by batting 2" wider all around, and then my batting 3" wider than top, using this method I can see the edge of my top, the edge of the batting and the edge of the backing all the way around, and know everything is square and good to go......
Next I run a row of safety pins in the middle from right to left, about 8 inches apart, this gives you a ' center flip point'...
Now what I like to do is the top first, so I flip the top to the middle (against the pins) drizzle my ESG (Elmer's SCHOOL Glue) in a thin lazy circle motion about 10-12" ON THE BATTING.....fold down the top and smooth with your hands until the section is wrinkle free, then fold back the top to the bottom of the previous glue, and drizzle again, flip down, smooth and continue until you have the top half done. At the point I spin the top around and do the other side in the same manner, only drizzling about 12" down at a time, do not worry if some of the glue soaks thru the top, it will dry and it will wash out......once the top is done...walk away for lets say 30-60 minutes, this will allow the glue to dry.... Now flip over your quilt having the un-glued backing on top and the dry smooth top on the bottom. You still have the safety pin row in the middle, that has kept everything together. Do exactly as you did for the top, flipping to the pin line, drizzling glue onto the batting and smoothing down the backing. YOU CAN GET IT AS SMOOTH AS GLASS.....once the back is done, and everything is smooth, I like to let it set for several hours or over night if possible....both sides should be very smooth, you will not have any wrinkles, your needle will not get gummed up and after your binding is on just throw it into the washer.....or not :p I hope this helps some people with this great cheap method.....if you need more help PM me

thanks again QB for all this information. I tried to find the Sharon Schambler utube - found so many!!! But I will definetly try the elmers glue deborahlees - I think I can handle that. The Schambler utube I started watching was more about squaring up your top on the backing. Getting corners square and easing in the bulk. Something I haven't had "yet" being a very new quilter. Don't look forward to that! Thanks again, so much great information and when I spread my "new knowledge" some find it hard to believe I haven't finished a quilt yet. LOL

I love Susan Schamber's method using the boards. Works perfectly every time--with glue

I spray baste on my bed. Fortunately it is a king but any bed will do. I cover the bed with a big flannel sheet, this protects from over spray AND holds everything in place. Put batting down, arrange backing, fold half of backing back, spray batting, smooth backing down, fold back other half, spray and smooth again. Flip that over, arrange quilt top on batting and repeat the fold back, spraying and smoothing process. Viola! You have a very smooth result that you will love. Just spray sparingly until you know how much it will take to hold nicely and it will not take as much as you might think. I have basted large king sized quilts alone in under an hour, and yes, sometimes I have to lift and shift the whole thing and layer in sections but the results are fantastic. I like 505, Dritz, June Taylor (new Improved Formula), but do NOT like Sullivan's.