Usually one only does that once (or one intents to only do it once - speaking from experience). lol

One point I wanted to add: If you use pins for basting, I would suggest the bent quilting pins and spend the extra money to get the closing tool. (Looks like a screwdriver with a blunt end and it saves your fingers.)

Don't lay out your sandwich on anything where scratches would be a bad thing. It is easy to scratch the surface with the pins - particularly when working fast.

I saw Eleanor (QIAD) use these and it was neat

I love the bent pins. With a coupon at Joanns you can get the multi colored covers for them that make it easier to handle.
You can use a crochet hook or a grapfruit spoon to help hook the pins but I do have the wooden handled tool that is easy on the hands.
You can use the big metal clips or you can buy the plastic round clips that hold smoothly to a 1 inch table. I use both, the smooth clips for the backing and the black clips for the top.

I never thought of a crochet hook. I tore my fingers up the other night pinning a quilt. After I ran out of pins I was looking for more and came across my "tool" that I used to use (forgot about it). 1/2 a clothes pin. I even put notches in it to catch the pin end.

Now I save my picture as a bit map instead of jpeg and it still didn't come up.

Like the idea of the crochet hook to help. That would help when basting as well. Sometimes my fingers get sore lifting needle up to pull through. The other day I used wooden skewers from my kitchen to do this, will drag out some crochet hooks before I take my next project to baste.

And yes, I use masking or painters tape to tape my backing to tables at the church to sandwich my quilts together.

Hey great idea kiddo. I actually am weird I guess. I use the big pins. Safety pin size.

Did you "preview"? THat seems to kick the picture out. BTW - it downloaded just fine.

Blue painter's tape is a great method. I buy it at the Dollar Store.

If you have access to a ping pong table, that also makes a large surface to lay a quilt out on. You can take the net off the middle if your quilt is large enough.