Sun Bonnet Sue each month of the year...wallhangings. No stash so....
 

Since I am a fairly new quilter...have sewn though forever but got rid of all extra fabric. So...I ordered this book from amazon (and 2 other books) and they came yesterday. I was so excited but after looking through the book at each month's project I thought...how the heck am I going to make all of these since I don't have anywhere near enough stash. For example...one month shows Sue at the beach so the square background fabric has to look like sand. Then she is wearing a sandle so her exposed foot is a darker tan. Dresses are one piece of fabric but then trim and a pocket of another fabric. Borders and blocks are different colors and then some of them have different small flowers. I could go on and on...but I think you can "get" what I mean. So much different fabric for one small wallhanging. So...off to Joann's today to get other supplies and fabric for a table runner. I kept looking at all of the fat quarters but didn't buy any today. Just wondering if you think that would be the way to go...at $1.99 each. I would hate to think about taking like 15 bolts of fabric to the cutting counter and saying that I want 1/4 yd. of each. They would be cursing me under their breath...lol.

Did get a deal on muslin...$1.99 a yard so I bought all that was on the bolt...almost 9 yds.

Off now to try to finish the binding on my patriotic quilt as a tribute to my deceased father who was a WWII vet and fought in all major battles against Germany. I'm going to attach his ribbons and medals to it and then once I attach the hanger on the back I am going to hang it on the inside of our front door using a wreath hanger. Then I will hang his dog tags over the hanger. (I sure used the word hang and hanger a lot...lol)

I know its a lot of trouble to get a lot of fabric cut, but it will be worth it. You get more for your money from the bolt than from a fat quarter. I have seen people in JoAnn's with carts full of cotton fabric bolts. Just have fun with it.

P.S. Your patriotic wall hanging sounds wonderful. Would love to see a picture of it.

Perhaps you could put a post in the Searching For thread? Say you're looking for scraps and give the largest piece you want. There are good prices there.

If you aren't in a big hurry, Joann will put the FQ's on sale for $1 eventually. That's when I buy them. $1.99 is $8 a yard and most of them aren't worth $8. You could also check out charm packs and layer cakes online to get more variety.

JoAnn's has FQ's for $1.29 right now...that's the lowest that I've seen them since the overall price increases.

Some quilt shops have plastic bags of scraps for sale. Keep looking!!!

My guild has a cast off table, where people bring in fabric in scraps or even yardage, blocks or UFO's that they do not want anymore. I have gotten a lot of fabric for free from this table over the years.

Thanks for all of the suggestions. I do agree that the fat quarters are expensive since a lot of the quilting fabric was on sale today and would have been cheaper to have 1/4 yard cut. I'll check some of the online sites for charm packs and layer cakes. Joann's doesn't have much choice in that department...at least the one that I went to. I don't know of any local quilt guilds...but I haven't "dug deep" to check it out. There are a couple of quilt shops that I haven't even checked out yet...probably in the spring when I know the weather will cooperate.

That's funny...all of the fat quarters are lined up between the top couple of shelves and bottom shelves of fabric at the Joann's I went to and no sale signs.

Oh...I was looking for a pair of magnifier glasses that you can clip to your regular glasses. Bought a pair there last year and I dropped them and they broke. I asked the lady at the cutting table and she said they did away with ALL magnifiers but had just a few in the bargain bins out front. Of course they were the ones with a handle that you hold to read. I can't believe it because a lot of older woman sew and have problems threading needles etc.

I have one side yet to sew the binding and then attach the sleeve. Hope to finish tomorrow and will see how well a picture looks with my computer camera. The digital...I don't have a clue how to use it since I bought if for my husband for Christmas about 7 years ago and he puts it somewhere and then can't remember where it is. lol

You can do so many things with Sue.

I love playing with Sue. Happy times ahead for you. Start slow, purchase a few yards that you like and eventually you'll have enough to place in different areas of Sue's blocks that the repetition won't seem as noticable.