September 2007

Every sew-er has one right? Surely I can’t be the only person out there who has a hard time throwing away fabric. Something eventually can be made with it, right? Right?

One of the great things about patchwork is that you don’t need large pieces of fabric to make something. You just need lots of little pieces and a couple spools of thread.

I have a tendency(mm, k, like always) make a second project out of the scraps left over from the first project. If it’s a quilt, I’ll usually have enough scraps to piece the top together, but I’ll have to run over to the store to get more for the backing and binding.

While I’m at the store, I can never just get the backing and binding that I went in there for. I’ll have to check out the new fabrics that came in. Check out some more that I’ve had my eye one. Thirty minutes later, I’ve stacked 25 bolts of fabric on the cutting table and hope that the nice ladies will not come after me with their rotary cutters. The problem with patchwork? I’ll want every pattern in a line, but only a quarter yard. So the poor ladies stand there and cut. And cut. And cut. And hope that I don’t come back again tomorrow. Sometimes I do though. I just hope someone different is working.

So, undoubtedly I’ll overbuy for the binding and backing. I’ll have scraps leftover. I must do *something* with them. I can’t just toss it. So they go in my room. Where eventually something will be done with it. I swear.

This is my guest room. Isn’t it lovely? I’m sure I overbought. There is a lot of fabric in that little cubby. Let’s not discuss how many yards there is or tell Sean how much I spent because, well, he reads my blog too. Hi Sean! Now go back to working dear.

These aren’t really scraps as much as just fabric that I haven’t gotten to. The patchwork on top? That was going to be a dress for Maeve. I never finished it because I couldn’t get the top right and it bugged me. So I cut the top of the dress off and saved the bottom. I couldn’t throw away perfectly pieced patchwork.

Ah, some scrumptious baby knits. I love these things. And see the selvedges in the background? I can’t throw those away either. I’m going to make a quilt out of them. I saw it on someone else’s blog and well, now I just have to make one too.

Ah, yes, the beautiful bin of ribbons. And leftover fabrics underneath. They are everywhere.

See, if you use a really narrow depth of field when taking photos, you can’t *really* see how much fabric is up there. Excellent.

The pile under the window. There are actually a couple quilts that need to be quilted in that stack. I’ll get right on that.

Crikey. More quilt tops that need quilting.

I got this silly idea to organize scraps into big Ziplocs, dividing them up by lines. Great idea. I doubt it will last that long. Why you ask?

Need I say more?

This is how small a piece of fabric has to be in order to get thrown away.

Yes, I just posted a picture of my trash can. I actually at one point had an Etsy packaging idea using the long, skinny strips. Go ahead and roll your eyes now.

You think that’s all?

And there are more. I’m sure. Buried under other scraps.

I thought about destashing on Etsy. It seemed like a good idea. Unfortunately, I was going to have to go into the Supplies section. They sell fabric there. I don’t need more. I don’t need more. I don’t need more. Go ahead and laugh.