I purchased a binder attachment for my Juki 2000 a few weeks ago and I finally got to try it out today. I personally hate attaching binding. The glue baste method made it slightly tolerable for me but I had seen a guild member use a quilt binder attachment on her Bernina and was smitten with it..
I have to say that I have practiced a bit today and am pretty confident now to put a binding on a quilt :D I promised myself that I'd remove the binding off of the iron caddy I made (oh, it's a REALLY bad binding job) so I think that might be my next victim I mean project for attaching a binding.
Here are two of the things I bound today... The tree on the left was an orphan block. The tree on the right with the bicycle was made by my friend, Heather. They are both going to be sent to be auctioned by the Alzheimer Art Quilt Initiative. I have completed 6 quilts in various different styles to send off. I thought I'd find some old orphans and use them as practice and AAQI donations.
I am in love with this binder attachment doohickey. I wish I would have bought and used this sooner! I've got several quilts that are just waiting for binding so hopefully by the end of the weekend, I'll have a stack of finished quilts to finally show off! Yay!
Most of the binders I found were two sides clean (folds under both sides) and that's not what I wanted. I got one that is one side raw, one side clean finish. I do that French fold binding so the "raw" edge is really my folded edge and the clean edge is the folded over edge so this worked out perfectly for me. I had to buy screws to attach the binder to the machine although I wish I just took my Juki to Home Depot to see if they had any screws that would work. I still might as the screws I bought from Raichert are ridiculously long. Hubby used some snips and cut them in half but they still don't screw in as nicely as I would like so I might take it in and see what I can find instead. It doesn't hurt to look....
I also followed a great video tutorial on mitering the corners. I have to say that my corners are sharp.
Overall - I say I'm a believer. I know machine binders aren't for everyone. There are a lot of people who enjoy the binding process. There are those like myself who absolutely detest doing it. I don't mind anymore. Bring 'em on!! ... okay, disclaimer... please don't send me your quilts to bind. I'm backlogged!