quiltingnd

This question is probably a day late and a dollar short since I've been quilting 2 yrs now, but i either read or heard something and it's got me wondering.

What steps do you do after you have quilted your quilt in order to make your quilt ready for binding?

Doggramma

All I do is trim it, making sure the corners are square. Then bind.

Tartan

Oh, it's quite a production! I lay my quilt out flat on the floor. I take all my rotary rulers and large 15 inch square ruler down there with me. I put the large square in the corner and line up my rulers end to end with the square down one side of the quilt. I draw along that line with white chalk and them do the other 3 sides. If everything looks good with a good 1/4 inch seam allowance for the binding, I put my cutting mat under the quilt and use my rulers to trim the edges.
I have knee pads that I wear for working on the floor. There are laser lights and quilters chalk lines you can buy to make the job easier but my way is cheaper.

quiltingnd

Tartan- Doesn't that make your borders look off?

I took a quilting class. That's where I learned to quilt. The only thing they had us do was lay the quilt out and then trim 1/4" over the border for the binding. No one ever told me I was suppose to *square up* my quilt at the end. At the end when I'm trimming you can see that the quilt has shifted and nothing seems completely straight anymore.

Jeanne S

This is all I do too!

feline fanatic

Some people "block" a quilt to help square it up. IMHO squaring up and blocking are really only necessary if the quilt is to be hung in a show or on a wall. Rarely will you notice a slightly out of square quilt laying on the bed and you will never notice it if it is in a perpetual state of being snuggled in.

Here are a few links for blocking and squaring up after quilting and before binding
http://www.kimmyquilt.com/article/blockingaquilt/
https://www.leahday.com/art-blockingquilt/
https://cowtownquilts.wordpress.com/...block-a-quilt/

Just google how to block a quilt and you will get loads of hits.

bearisgray

in my opinion, a quilt that was properly constructed does not need to be blocked to lay properly.

I do something like tartan does, except I have a 96x38 inch table to lay it on. i trim the backing and binding even with the top.

I sew the three layers together about 1/8 inch from the outside edge. it makes it easier for me to apply the binding because then I do not need to worry about missing one of the layers.

. I also baste the edges of my binding together before sewing it on to the quilt. I usually use bias binding and seeing it together prevents one edge from "walking" ahead of the other.

with the edges sewn, I am basically lining up two sets of edges, instead of trying to kee p five separate edges together.

feline fanatic

Even the most meticulously constructed quilt can be distorted in the quilting process. Machine quilting distorts more than hand quilting and longarm quilting distorts more than DSM quilting. It is just the nature of fabric to want to stretch distort or contract when being manipulated by the quilting process. Every quilt I make is perfectly square when it goes on the rack but I have yet to have a quilt come off the rack that is exactly the same measurements it was before quilting. It may only be off fractions of an inch, but it is different.

bearisgray

in my opinion, a quilt that was properly constructed does not need to be blocked to lay properly.

I do something like tartan does, except I have a 96x38 inch table to lay it on. i trim the backing and binding even with the top.

I sew the three layers together about 1/8 inch from the outside edge. it makes it easier for me to apply the binding because then I do not need to worry about missing one of the layers.

. I also baste the edges of my binding together before sewing it on to the quilt. I usually use bias binding and seeing it together prevents one edge from "walking" ahead of the other.

with the edges sewn, I am basically lining up two sets of edges, instead of trying to kee p five separate edges together.

Sewnoma

This is me, too. I just cross my fingers a lot if it's one that's going to hang, LOL.