Quilt Binding Tutorial

In December I posted a quickie basting tutorial and I asked if anyone would like me to do a binding tutorial, several people asked and it is time for me to deliver!

This is a picture heavy tutorial – my apologies!

The steps that I am going to detail in this tutorial will work for virtually any machine quilt binding that you will do.

For the Valentine Pinwheel Table Runner you will need three strips measuring 2.5” x WOF (width of fabric) – I am using solid fabric for my border. If you are using a patterned fabric make sure you sew your strips right sides together.

Placing fabric corner to corner, right sides together, take a ruler and draw a line with an air or water soluble pen/pencil from corner to corner.

Pin in place and sew along the line you drew.

Place your ruler with the ¼” mark on stitched line – trim triangle off

Press your fabrics open and repeat until all your strips are sewn together

Fold your strip in half and press along the entire strip.

Note Before: when you are going to do the entire binding on the machine – sew your binding to the back first. If you plan on hand sewing your binding down – sew your binding to the front first!

Place the raw side of the strips to the quilt edge. I like to start in the center of the quilt and have an excess of 8-12 inches of strip when you start sewing.

Sew the strip to the quilt with a ¼” seam. Stop sewing when you are ¼” from the corner.  (I like to measure with a tape measure and place a pin so I know where to stop).

When you reach the corner, you will want to fold the fabric back (refer to picture)

The fold your fabric back down  – align it with the next edge you will be sewing on (you are creating your mitered corners)

Repeat the last two steps at each corner. Stop sewing when you are 8” from where you started.

Fold the strips in towards each other – meeting in the middle, fold the strips back on top of themselves.

Fold the strips down, making a point

Using a quilting ruler – place it on the edge of the quilt and cut off the excess fabric from the binding strips.

Place the strips right sides together, draw a line corner to corner, sew on the line and trim ¼” from stitching and press open

Finish sewing down your binding

Fold your binding over to the front, at this point you can pin or not pin (I start out pinning usually and then end up just folding the fabric over with my fingers).  Pick a decorative stitch or straight stitch. NOTE:  Make sure when you fold your fabric over that you are covering the stitching from when you attached the binding to the back!

I like to pin my corners down until I am ready to sew them (literally right until the needle is about to hit the pin). I also leave my needle down, lift my foot and turn at the corner rather than starting and stopping at each corner.

Congratulations you have just machine sewn your binding!

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