This part is tedious...the mitering. What is mitering? Well, thanks for asking! I'm happy to fill you in. A Miter (thanks wikipedia for the link) is simply an angled or beveled cut. The corners of picture frames are mitered. Molding in your house is mitered at the corners to form a 90 degree angle.
To miter a joint, you simply need a miter box and a saw. Here is mine:
A miter box (mine is plastic) is a box with guidelines in it. The saw can fit in there and cut a perfect 45 degree or 90 degree angle. You can hold the molding in there tight and get a nice clean cut.
I am sawing each cut by hand to make the cleanest cut. It's taking some time, but I think will be worth it for a great finished look. There are spots where it's fairly easy.....
<------------ like here:
And there are spots where it's not easy, like here: I'm not happy with these cuts, but I'm going to keep going and decide whether to come back and redo these.
Along long walls also along requires a miter cut. My quarter round is only 8 feet long; my walls are longer than that. Where two pieces meet, a better finished look is attained by mitering each piece as opposed to butting two ends together. And now posting these pictures, I see how badly the shoe holding needs to be painted.....and soon!
So I'm mitering and nailing, foot by foot. And nailing, being very careful to keep my fingers out of the way. It's not a fun part of the job, but the difference the finish makes is big.
Image via Wikipedia
Compound miter joint (Photo credit: slworking2)
A miter box (mine is plastic) is a box with guidelines in it. The saw can fit in there and cut a perfect 45 degree or 90 degree angle. You can hold the molding in there tight and get a nice clean cut. 
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