You don't have to spend a major amount of money to have a quilting frame for hand quilting. With some lumber and C clamps you can make a frame. For supports the frame can sit on the backs of chairs if nothing else is available to hold it up. Sawhorses would be another thing to use to hold up the frame.
Use 2x4 lumber in a length needed to fit the width of the quilt to be sewn, use some strips of old cotton sheets, wrap it around the boards tightly 2 or 3 times to cover completely and pin it securely with safety pins or staple it to the board. Assemble your frame into a square using the C clamps and rest it on the supports. Take one short end of the quilt, pin it securely to the strips on the frame. Then do the other end and when finished pinning, roll that end of the quilt around the board, taking up the slack and making it as tight possible when clamped, leaving an exposed area for stitching that can be easily reached when sitting down. Pin the sides of the quilt to the side bars of the frame, making the quilt taut as you do. As you finish quilting one section, release the sides, roll up the finished section onto the first board and unroll a new section from the second board then repin the sides and re-set the clamps. If necessary you can pin or baste a long scrap of fabric to the ends and pin these to the frame cloth strips to make it easier to work on the very ends.
In Pioneer days when there wasn't much room in small cabins a quilt frame was attached to the ceiling by using pulleys and ropes then could be lowered to work on. It could be suspended over the dinner table or over a bed in the bedroom.
A nice thing about a frame like this is that it can be set up anywhere easily, can be made any size you want or need. You can paint the raw wood before wrapping with strips, thereby protecting the wood and eliminating splinters. The 2x4 boards are stronger than most of the commercial quilting frames with dowel-like rods for holding the quilts.
There are variations of this type of frame, one of which is several holes would be drilled along the ends of the boards to use pegs or bolts for holding the corners together instead of C clamps. I like the clamps myself.
Edey
