Ok, I find that every time I walk into Wal-Mart, I go straight to the fabric and craft section to look for new gadgets, tools and notions. In my down time (everything else has been done.. chores, etc.), I search for fabric / fabric combinations. I also delve into my graphics app and design quilts. Sooo... My question is do the rest of you quilters do the same thing? I will go into a fabric shop and just purchase fabric because I like it (like a kid in a candy store), with absolutely no quilt / home decor idea or design in mind. I always think, "I will find something to use it in". My fabric will sit there until suddenly something pops into my head. I normally let the fabric inspire me, versus planning something out. Sorry so long.... just wondering if all of this is common. :)

Oh, yes, you are a quilter of the collecting sort! You have a great deal of company. I pick up fabric I like and try to match it up later (and usually do). It's called starting or adding to your stash!

I'm just like that only I don't wait to get all my work done hahaha

Hahaha, I am so much like this, at walmart it's the fabric or the quilting magizines...

I consider all of that to be completely normal LOL and I LOVE it too :D:D:D

"Oh, yes, you are a quilter of the collecting sort! "

yep, dats me lol... I have enough notions/fabrics/books to look like I have been quilting for yrs... Yet I've only made 1 and a half quilts.............so far lol

Sounds about right to me!

Wait for the housework to be done.... I don't think so.lol.
The main reason I leave our home is to go over to the material souk to purchase more material.. You never know when you might need that particular piece....

Oh yes I get cold sweats palms shake if I am not on the computer purchasing something. Now my supplier has taken a break to quilt!!! How could she :) Just kidding. I have a bucket of fabric just for me and only me for a quilt I am going to make one day.

See? You are not alone! :)

Before you go to sleep, are your last thoughts about quilt patterns and the colors you would choose and how you could combine the blocks? Do you love to just have an open quilt pattern book open and imagine the possibilities while you're watching TV or a passenger in the car? Were you terribly sad when HGTV canceled "Simply Quilts?" When you go online, do you check your quilting sites first for any news? Do you wear threads on your clothing (from so much sewing) and tell your friends it's your favorite accessory?

lol... I'll consider myself, then, in the best of company! :D I have also found that I am a Huge South Seas Print collector. I love their fabrics! Oh when I began quilting, I assumed that WalMart fabric was just as suitable as any other, until I discovered our small town's only fabric shop, and oh, how wrong I was! lol The difference in the quality and feel of the fabric is like the difference between cheap sheets and pure luxury sheets. Even the fabric at Hobby Lobby cannot hold a candle to quality 100% cotton quilting fabric. We have this store in Franklin, TN (a suburb of Nashville), and you would not believe the thousands and thousands of bolts of fabrics, it's pure Heaven. :) The name of it is Stitcher's Garden if anyone in Tennessee is interested. :)

Oh, I so go on Quilting book binges, anywhere from ebay to Amazon and all in between. lol...

Ohhhhh you are so "in" with the quilting crowd. :D Ain't it great? :D :-D :-D I can spend hours online at various Fabric Shops! And that is the first thing I think of when I decide to go shopping.... I route my trip around Fabric Shops. :D I've taken over 3 rooms and will soon need to find a larger home if I do not stop it though. :D :D :D It is WONDERFUL!!! :wink:

yep me too tho i have made a few quilts i often impulse buy my fabric

YES!!! you are one of the "In Crowd"!!!!!! Welcome to the "Club" !!!!

Oh do you fit in. I think of quilting all the time and seem to not be able to sleep unless the dream is about fabric or notions or thread or patterns or....You get the drift. Welcome to the crowd!

I guess you don't have to feel wierd, because we all to everything you have mention.

I have my own addiction. If I see a quilt , I want to know how it is put together. I've got magazines and books, I research, Amish, Baltimore, Southwestern, I want to know the source of inspiration. The colours, the design of the fabric, if it is designer fabric, I want to know about that person. My hands are leaving me, somedays they are shaking so much, so I'm turning into an historian, Behind every quilt there is an history. Just as a painting connaisseur, I'm learning about what is related to quilting

Welcome to the "addict" club :lol: I buy fabric all the time because i like it and stash it away until a pattern design pops into my head. I have some that have been waiting for a long time that i'm just now cutting up. Don't worry, you are in good company!!!!

Absolutely, positively - YES!!!! I can't you how many times I've done that.

Now you know why I have over 1,000 yds of fabric in my stash! Its an addiction that I hope never cures!

Before I made my first quilt (early September this year), I sewed a bit. I would only buy what I needed for a certain project. I had a teeny tiny stash that consisted of ends of yardage I bought (I always buy 1/2-1 extra to make SURE I don't run out). Then I bought what I needed for my first quilt, did that and decided I wanted to make another one. When I was searching for the perfect fabrics for that one, I found a bunch to use with DD to make HER quilt. In Walmart, when I went to get my daughter's pictures taken, I walked out with 13 fat quarters a can of basting spray, extra bobbins, needles for my machine...

THEN I found a lady who was cleaning out her craft room and selling oodles of quilting fabrics...I spent $160 at her house, and I now have three of those oversized linen grocery bags STUFFED with fabrics, enough batting to make like 6 or more quilts (not counting mini's, wall hangings, or the two packs of Insul-Bright!), books, magazines, templates...

Before I started my first quilt, I was never interested in starting a new project right at the completion of the current one...now, I have a gazillion ideas and plans. I work at my kitchen table, the place with the most space, but I used to just do one project and put everything away until I was inspired again...Now, I'm re-organizing my basement in my head to set up a sewing space that I don't have to clear out every day at dinner, and a place to display my stash so I don't have to dig through bags to be inspired. ;)

I have only completed two quilts and am in the process of the third, I KNOW I have a LOT to learn. But I also know I am *absolutely* a quilter. And YOU are too!!!

Oh you are a quilter and it is a good addiciton, trust me. There is no drug out there, that gives me such a high as a finished quilt. OR buying fabric for a new project.

Oh you so fit right in :) I am not so much the material collector. To much of a control freak to have mish mash - but let me loose near patterns...

Oh yes, I do the same thing. Most of my fabric has been purchased because I like it not because I have a project ready to work on.

I recently got fabric on sale( at $4/yd). just couldn't resist so I bought 15 yards of various patterns.
I just love to look at it and feel it.

Chris

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

I don't see a thing wrong with it ....I do the same thing. When traveling, I look up in the phone books quilt shops and make it part of the trip. DH is very understanding. I also check out all the ads for estate sales, rummage sales, etc for anything that could lead to more fabric or items.
You are perfectly normal. :thumbup:

Absolutely!!!

I was already a fabric collector before I became a quilter!

I was in this store years and years ago, and it seems from reading the reviews on the website that things have not changed in all those years. Yes, they have a TON of fabric. But it is so deeply stacked that you can't even see half of what's there. I had to side-step down rows to traverse them, and backup, move out of the way, when meeting another shopper coming toward me. Bolts were stacked 10-12 deep in front of shelves, impossible to move enough to see what was on the shelves. Tight, tight!

I got the distinct impression at the time that this was someone's personal stash, a true hoarding addiction, that she finally had to create a store front to continue to accumulate. I also didn't find the staff helpful or knowledgeable. I DID find some 15+ year old collector Mary Ellen Hopkins fabric to die for and bought it! And she probably has/had every Jinny Beyer print ever made at the time.

When I had my shop in Dallas, I often suggested this store for those customers who had exhausted every source for a missing fabric, but now wonder if they ever received a response to their letters asking about any specific fabric.

Still, I'd go back there....on a good physical day.

Jan in VA

Welcome to the club! You're one of us now.

I was happy to read all the comments here and realize I'm not so weird after all.

I don't collect fabric (don't have room to store it), but I do collect rulers & gadets. I LOVE rulers. Garage sales are the best for that. One of my brothers is a garage sale fiend...you wouldn't believe the stuff he's found for me!

You mean you have to have room to store it? Nobody told me that! I just buy it and then worry about where I'll stash it -- closets, under bed, trunk of car, etc. Just me, but I love fabrics.

Yup..I'm the same way.. Ive got tons of fabric but always searching for more whether i have a quilt or project in mind or not.. Never know when I might need THAT fabric and then kick myself latter for not getting it right then and there..So I usually pick it up right then and there..lol

I don't always get all my work done either! LOL
The Walmart where I live doesn't have a fabric dept, but Marden's does. I also have an LQS one mile from my house! There is another one about 7 miles away! I also go online a lot.
I do LOVE this quilting board, but today for the first time I didn't get my morning email and I am worried. I checked it out and I am still listed so I don't know what happened. Will have to contact the admin and see.

i believe all quilters are alike. i am glad i am not the only one who does this.I take weekly trips to the LQS just to see if there is something new that i have to have. luckily my husband doesn't mind when he see all the receipts from my fabric purchases.

Quiltforme - are you talking about me. It is a well deserved rest. LOL. This is my first day not selling and it is great. I have actually got a lot of shipping done. And yes, I love to shop. Cabbage Rose in Ft. Worth is moving across the street and is having a moving sell. I am so thre tomorrow with a couple of quilting friends. I buy becasue it's on sale and pretty and I know I can always find a pattern for it. Right now I am into big prints and planning to start a OBW or Stack and Whack. SO need lots of fabrics to see which is best. Buy,buy.....Just read the line under my name. That's me-researcher of fabrics

[quote=stitchinbee] . . .(everything else has been done.. chores, etc.),/quote]

I'm supposed to be doing something else?????

Oh that is so me. But I do get a few quilts done in the meantime most likely because they are for a special someone and occasion. I do have some pattern that have yet to be hooked up to my stash but that is a WIP.