I managed to sort through my scrap and string storage. My focus was on how I use them, not on storage.
I emptied one cart of drawers and, surprisingly, half of the second cart. I knew that if I kept the empty cart, I’d just fill it up again rather than think about what I was keeping and why. Normally, these inexpensive carts are a bit wobbly. My husband riveted sheet metal to the back to stabilize them, so I like using them. I just had more storage than I actually needed. I asked a friend who likes to use scraps for her leaders/enders if she could use the empty cart, and she said yes so I dropped it off to her yesterday.
The carts were always intended to store strings by color, but I thought my future included making a lot of string blocks with friends so I was tossing larger scrap pieces in as well and those quickly filled the drawers.
Flattening the strings and stacking them neatly also helped reduce the amount of space they consumed. The fourth drawer was temporarily holding some possible quilt bindings but I decided to add them to my scrap bins and use with 2 1/2″ strips instead so that drawer is empty now too.
This cart contains scraps that are smaller than quarter yard but at least 5″ wide. I decided to only keep batiks or scraps that read as solid so the three bins that once held a lot of mixed prints are now empty.
These are the fabrics I removed from the scrap and string storage. I’ll go through them a little at a time. It’s going to take a few days because I need to be intentional and realistic about what I decide to keep.
I enjoy making coordinated scrap quilts with contemporary designs and I also love spectrum quilts, so the blue bin on the left are keepers.
It’s the bin on the right that will be tricky. Tomorrow I plan to go through my inspiration photos and choose four scrap quilts I’d like to make. I’ll print pictures of those to keep them in front of me with four of those drawers from the sting cart about. I ‘ll add fabrics that will work with each design and the drawer will limit how much of those I keep too. I know one drawer is more than enough for a quilt top!
It’s unrealistic to think I’ll make more than four scrap quilts next year. I have a “top 12” list of quilts I want to make, some ideas for precuts I own that I’d like to get to, and no doubt I’ll want to mix in a couple of string quilts. All those projects will generate even more scraps!
I have a couple of other bags of scraps that I need to go through at the same time. Wish me luck! &&
