Scrap Saver System ~ One Inch?

Starting a fabric scrap saver system takes some thought, and it should fit your quilting style. What’s my style? I’m not really sure. I just know I love fabric and quilts. I do know I’m drawn to bright fabrics...think of a box of crayons without the black and brown. And with fabric prices always climbing, I like to hang on to every bit, because sometimes those tiny scraps turn out to be surprisingly useful.

For my scrap system I'll be cutting the strips and squares 1", 1.5", 2", 2.5, 3", 3.5", 4.5", 5" and 6.5". 

Wide backing fabric scraps will not be cut or put into the scrap saver system unless they are less than 5" wide.  The way I see it those larger long pieces of fabric can be pieced into a wide backing.

 This post was inspired by Carol.  She commented on my last post which was about cutting fabrics for my new scrap saver system.  She wanted to know what I planned to do with the 1" strips.

Well, years ago I made the quilt below with 1" squares. They were scraps from my Promenading Tulips quilt.  It was a spur of the moment thing, I didn't plan to use them until I saw all the cute little scraps on my cutting table and thought, "they are too pretty to put in the trash".

Around the same time, I made this mini Ocean Waves quilt, also scraps from the Tulip quilt. The HSTs were created using the flippy corners method. This mini quilt is currently in storage, and I don’t want to dig it out to check the finished size of the HSTs, but judging by the cutting mat in the image, they appear to be about 3/4" finished.

I enjoy working with tiny fabric pieces now and then, but not all the time. The quilt below was also made using leftover flippy corner scraps.

And let’s not forget applique. The center of the flower shown below is smaller than half an inch, so as you can see, small scraps are definitely a good thing for me.

We took the long way around to answer Carol’s question, but the truth is I only have one project in mind that uses 1" strips...the OMIGOSH quilt pattern by Sue Garmen. I bought the pattern 2-4 years ago but haven’t been brave enough to start. The quilt finished size is too small for my taste, I prefer large, bed sized quilts. So, using her pattern, I did the math to make more blocks. Looks like I’ll need to start saving a lot more scraps—probably about two years’ worth! HAHA!

Now it's confession time.  I save pieces smaller than one inch.  However, in the last few years I've limited myself on what I can save.  Not every tiny scrap is saved anymore.  Rules have to be put in place for fabric hoarders like me.  My rule is... I can save it if it will fit in this drawer.  As you can see its pretty full and there's quite a few 1" strips.  Hmmm....if I add them to the scrap saver system it would free up space for more tiny bits of precious fabric in this bin!

It's been a while since I last dug through it ...so while I got it out I had to dump it and take a look.  Notice the TINY pieces less than 1".

Oh, what the heck I deserve a little playtime, let's dump it all!

This picture lets me know the hoarding isn't quite as controlled as I like to think. HAHA!

Smooshing it down so it will fit back in the rolling cart.  Looks like there's more room in there than I thought!  Yah!

EDIT This post was written on Wednesday morning and was set to publish on Friday.  Well Thursday morning I woke up, walk past the sewing room and saw the scraps of a fabric and made a major decision.

I think it's time to let go of anything less than 1".  I don't know what happened while I slept but if you're reading this, I'm still feeling the same.  The tiny scraps need to go.  

The way I see it now is...there's more fabric in my sewing room than I could possibly use in my lifetime.  Should the need arise for itty bitty pieces of fabric I can cut them from larger pieces of fabric.

So, it's settled.  I'm going to start purging this drawer and putting what I can into the scrap saver system. It's going to take a day or two (maybe more) to sort through this bin, press and cut anything 1 inch or larger.  

 By doing this I'm bending my own rule for the scrap saver system which was to only process fabrics from current projects. 

Up to this point my scraps have been sorted by color and stored in drawers under my quilt frame. For years I thought it best to leave them as they were until I had a plan for them. To process all of them into a scrap saver system would be overwhelming.   

 

  About 10 years ago I started cutting my scraps using Bonnie system, but it quickly became scary and overwhelming.   My plan now for these bins is to never add new scraps to them but gradually try to work them into the scrap saver system as I make quilts from them.

Why the big shift in how I feel about fabric scraps?  A YouTube channel called From Small Things.  I've been watching her channel since the first video was published, about a year and half ago.  And in that year and half she has swayed my opinion on the scrap saver system and how to best use your scraps without being overwhelmed or having way too much of them. It'll take a few years (if ever) for me to get to where Sue is with her system but I'm going to give it shot.

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The Utility Quilt

 Yesterday I pulled out the green scraps cut and pieced back in February and March.   The original plan was to start a scrap saver system sorta like Bonnie Hunters of Quiltville or Lori Holts of Beeinmybonnet.  Well old habits are hard to break.  My quilting style is cut it and sew it.  So that's what I ended up doing.  I just couldn't help myself.

When sewing these together there was no plan.  I just needed some sew time.  It was a grab and sew kind of method.  This quilt does not need to pretty, only functional.  But after cutting them into Railed Fence blocks I realized this did not produce enough blocks.  Cutting and sewing more strips isn't an option. Well not one I want to do.  So I'll need to pull from what I consider to be my "old ugly yardage stash".

My stash of old ugly greens is huge so it was easy to find four greens that I thought would work for a plain alternate block, border and backing.

Not the prettiest fabric but they will work just fine.  After all I'm not shooting for pretty, we just need to keep Mr. Podunk warm on a fishing or hunting trip.  If I make it look nice it would upset me should something happen to the quilt.  Impressing his buddies with my quilting skills is not my goal either.  

I laid out a few of the blocks on top of the fabrics to  see how they will look.  Why did I waste my time?  I'm using these fabrics no matter how they look because I'm not going to dig through my cabinet again.  

And just as I thought, I'll use the lighter fabrics for the alternating plain blocks and the darker fabrics for the backing.

The backing will also have a strip of scraps I pieced from the leftovers of the Rail Fence blocks.  I didn't want to put any green fabric scraps back in the scrap bin.   

I'm in no hurry to get this one finished.  Mr. Podunk will not need a new camp quilt until this fall.  So I can work on it every now again over the summer.  He had a camp quilt until we used it for little Miss Khaleesi.  Look at that innocent face.

She decided it looked pretty darn tasty.   Silly dog.  I could put a patch over the hole it's not too big.  But we decided it's now her quilt.  I may patch it anyway.  We'll see.  Neither of us have a sentimental attachment to the old blue jeans and flannel shirts used in the making of the quilt.   I made this quilt over 15 years ago.  It's been well loved and used often.  Sometimes you just have to let it go.  Had I thought she was going to chew on it I would have never let her use it for a bed.  Live and learn....she is a dog, what was I thinking?  

Moving along green scraps!

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Making Plans For Scraps, Leaders and Enders?

 Well I'm still sorting fabrics and making plans for new projects. If you missed out on the mess I made you can read about it here.   These may or may not get made but at least the scraps will be a little more organized.  I do this every now and then.  While organizing my mind can create some beautiful quilt designs that may or may not be made.  It's also very therapeutic.  Just standing here looking at this mound of fabric makes me sigh.   What a glorious site to behold.  Instead of designing a quilt I think I'll let these fabrics work their own magic by making a Scrappy Vortex Quilt.  You can see and read more about Crazy Mom Quilts Vortex quilt here.  It was a quilt along from a few years ago.  It's a great idea for mindless sewing and using up some scraps.

Not all of the scraps I've been hoarding will make it into a quilt.  This big yellow bag has become my dog pillow bag.  Most of the scraps in this back were in glass jars that were for decoration in my studio.  It's time to let them go and put them to good use.  Waste not, want not, right?  So a dog bed is the perfect answer.  In the bottom of the bag is also some smaller pieces of batting that will never be used.  Seriously, I've been holding onto it for 5-10 years, the chance of me using aren't good.  Not to mention there still 10 times that much I'm keeping.

During this cleaning and organizing I've also gathered up all the flippy corner bonus HST's and put them in one box.  The box on the right holds the needs to be cut to a usable size pieces.  The box on the left is the finished HST's squared up and sorted by size in labeled baggies. 

 I've also added a marker and extra baggies should I need them for different sizes.  Two days of chasing down baggies and a marker made me wonder why I didn't just add them to the box.  I buy both baggies and markers in large quantities.  So chasing them down everyday seems a little silly.

Every morning the first thing I do in the studio before starting anything else is grab a few HST's and square them up.  Doing as many as I can in 30 minutes before working on my current quilt project.  At this pace it could take months to finish them.  That is IF I can stick with it.  I've tried this before and....well...here I am still trying to get them done.  Wish me luck!

Now it's time to admit that I have a problem.  A one inch HST was saved today.  Why?  Well my motto has always been "If I can put a stitch it, I can quilt it."  The hoarder in me can not let it go, at least not for now.

In my defense I want to show you a quilt I made a few years ago.  The blocks finish at 1.25".  They to were flip and clip bonus HST's.  So there....I have and excuse for hoarding.  HA!

I wish I could tell you the box of triangles was all of them but it is not.  I also have many more that still need to be stitch together.  And with every quilt this just keeps getting larger.  Can I ever get to the bottom of this jar as a leaders and enders?  Only time will tell.  My instinct says just go sew a few together every day after you trim up the ones in the box.  Maybe I could devote another 30 minutes the the jar of triangles.

I might as well come clean.  I have another stash of triangles in my sewing cabinet.  These are all white.  There's also a stash of hundreds of white 2.5" squares under the lid. I promise that's all of them, that I know of.

Is it really hoarding if it's organized?  At what point does it tip the crazy scale?  The lens you use to look through makes all the difference when it comes to crazy.  I know you all understand...this is not crazy, it's just good common sense.  I see fabric scraps like this $$$$.  Not to open a can of worms but things have been a little crazy in the last year.  Who knows what can happen next.  If toilet paper sells out I've got us covered with hoarded fabric I don't like.  HAHA!

I'm moving along some scraps this week.  Whoo hoo!  MOOVING!!!!!!!!

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Implementing the Scrap Saver System

 Well I've pulled out and dusted off the die cutter and decided to jump on board the scrap saver system.  What's the point of having all those scraps if you don't use them.  And what's the point of having a die cutter if you don't use it.  So lets do this!  Woohoo!  I'm super excited to get this journey started.  I'll be using the Bonnie Hunter scrap system.   As we all know she is the Scrap Queen.  So we might as well follower her lead.

My scraps are sorted by colors and age.  I know what your thinking, AGE?  Yes, I have a larger older and less loved bunch of scraps.  These go back to my early years of quilting when my pallet of choice was much darker.   Then I have my smaller "new" scrap stash of bright fabrics.  

To start off this scrap cutting journey I need to deal with the old fabrics first.  With this being a new to me way of dealing with scraps the chances of errors are pretty good.  Errors on old ugly fabric don't hurt as bad as errors on pretty new loved fabrics.  

Now which color do I start with first?  Hmmm.... Let's start with the green scrap bins.  It's getting close to St' Patrick's day so why not make this festive little activity. 

Years of saving scraps can't be sorted and cut in one day or one week.  Keeping my expectations real, I decided to pull out what I think will be 2 or 3 hours worth of work.  That seems like a reasonable plan.  If it works out well I could make this a weekly activity.  So here's what I pulled from the first bin.  Finding a few 2.5" strips felt like I won the jackpot.  No cutting required, YAH!  I'm off to a good start.  Now to start pressing the pile of fabrics to be cut. 

In my research about using die cutters I read you will get better results if you starch the fabrics.  I also read that this really expensive new product is the best.  I'll let you know what I think about this new to me product on Friday with a new Nifty Notions review.

As I dug through the second bin of green I found this bag of low volume whites hiding in the bottom.  This was a happy surprise. I might be able to combine the two green bins to make one since the low volume white needs to find it's way to the neutral bin.

Then I found tons of string fabric.  Should I toss it in the scraps for dog bins or save them for making rugs?  UGG, this is getting hard.  I'm a fabric hoarder.  The hoarder in me says deal with at another time.  So for now they will stay right here.

I didn't make a very big dent in my green stash bins.  Sigh...this scrap saver system could take months to complete.

After starching and ironing things moved along much quicker.  The Sizzix can cut through 10 layers of fabric at a time.  ZIP! ZIP! ZIP! Lickety split!

Here's the results of my first scrap saver system cutting session.  Several 2.5" strips, some strings for string blocks and a pile of scraps for the dog bed stuffing stash.  It took a little longer than planned, about 4 hours.  Hopefully this will get easier and faster. 

The problem.  Cutting fabric = Sewing fabrics.  It's only natural.  I cut fabric, I make a quilt, it's instinct.  The wheels start turning for a quick log cabin quilt or maybe a scrappy trip around the world.  Or I could whip out a really quick rail fence quilt!  Oh dear lord what have I done?  Do I start another project or do I continue with the scrap saver plan?

My word of the year

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