psthreads

Does the glue help with keeping the wave out of the boarder?

MariaEH

Thanks for the tip on fixing wavy borders as I too, have that problems. I may have to use you guys suggestions.

DawnFurlong

I do the same as Bearisgray (minus the extra on the ends). I know my quilts are never perfectly square, but so far (knock on wood) this has worked out for me.

BUT - it is great to see what others do so that I have other options should I need it!

Barb in Louisiana

I keep it simple. My quilts are typically square because I measure and square up all the elements as I go. And, yes, I do a good bit of ripping and resewing to achieve this. Having squared up everything as I go means that the borders should be the same on opposite ends, or at least within 1/2 inch of each other.

Regardless of whether I cut the border, length of fabric or WOF, I still mark and pin at each end and on the 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 points on the top and the border before I start sewing. Then I snug the border which is on the top as I sew the two together. I have never had a wavy border when I did it this way.

I found out really early in quilting, that if I just laid a length of border on the pieced top and just let the machine pull it in freely, it would wave every time. I think that must be because the bottom feed dogs do pull in a tiny bit more of the fabric closest to them every time they move. This extra pulling ends up with the top being longer than the bottom, so it can only wave.

bearisgray

The "ordinary" machines - that don't have dual feed - do pull the bottom layer a bit more/faster than the top layer.

That's why the saying is that if one has to stretch something to fit - have the layer that needs to be stretched on the top -
or to "sew with a 'relaxed bottom'"

1screech

I lay both borders across the center of the quilt and cut them at the same time. If the sides are not an exact fit, I either stretch the border a bit or work in the fabric to fit. This helps to square up the quilt also.