I, too, played with my mom's scrap material, but I do not remember ever having much in the way of "scraps" from anything, including food, etc. I had three brothers and two sisters and my dad was a carpenter. Mother didn't work outside the home until I was in my early teens. Any fabrics that were left from her sewing our clothes with feed sacks, were put in braided rugs, or something useful for our home. Our flour, sugar, etc. all came in feed sacks so we didn't have a lot to throw out. My dad always had a garden for vegetables and mom made bread, pies, cakes. She had a sewing day, a bake day, a wash day, and an ironing day. I don't remember a day when she bought groceries. I don't think she did. We grew everything.