I built a nice stash by first buying fabrics that caught my eye. Now I have a lot of "theme" fabrics, but not many background type. Now I'm looking for those, and I find lots of nice ones on sale or in a remnant bin. But you can also find a pattern and go from there. It just depends on what you want. Not everybody works from a stash, but I like having one. I bought 3 yards if I really liked it. 2 yards of I sort of liked it and 4 yards if I really, really, really liked it. Now I think 4 yards is too much unless you have something specific in mind for it.