Hi Gale! I wish I had her gadget for cutting the fringe at the same time. What a lifesaver that would be.
I'm not sure what you're asking here. By "eight inch blocks" are you referring to your batting squares, or did you cut the back squares a different size than your front squares? I usually cut my batting the size that the block will finish at once I sew them together. (for instance if I'm making 9" blocks and taking a 1" seam, they will finish at 7", so I cut my batting squares out at 7") I just layer the three together, and I'm not all that careful about getting the batting exactly in the middle because it's not really going to show if it's smaller than the raw cut squares once you get them sewn together. Once I've layered them I just sew an X on the block and voila`! Block is ready to sew to the next one. :)
Hope that helps. If not, I'm sorry I didn't understand what you were asking.