I ordered fabric and a few more items (all on sale) from Connecting Threads. I ordered from them as so many people here seem happy with their fabric. I expected that for the price, I would be okay with the fabric and use it for some gift and charity items that could take lesser quality fabrics.
Boy, was I wrong!
First of all the cottons are very silky. I was amazed that they are thicker than most of the cottons in the local quilt stores and certainly thicker than what I have found at Joann's.
I thought that perhaps they weren't as wide as usual especially when I saw their wide selvages. Wrong again. Even with the wide selvages they were 44 inches.
Okay, so maybe they would run. I took a dark red and put in in the washer on hot with a piece of muslin. The muslin came out white. I threw them in the dryer. The fabric came out very nice- it wasn't even the wrinkled up, bunched up piece that I was expecting. I didn't put in fabric softener and it was smooth and didn't need immediate pressing.
Okay so I measured it thinking that it must at least have shrunk. No, it measured the same size.
Then it occurred to me that perhaps it wasn't 100% cotton. I was brought up to believe that you usually get what you pay for and since I didn't pay that much there must be a flaw somewhere.
So I called them up to ask if the fabric was 100% cotton. The woman who spoke with me could not have been nicer. She explained that yes, it was 100% cotton and that the cotton was grown in the US! As we have no fabric mills left in the US, it must be milled outside but they have specifications that the fabric must meet. I told her that I was thrilled at the quality of their fabric and she very kindly thanked me and told me that their weekly sales start on Wednesday. They're posted at 9am West coast time. This week some of their batiks are on sale! I happily placed another order and also ordered more of their clearance fabrics!
Thank you to those people on this site that mentioned this shop. I just love the fabric and the people there were so nice. She also explained that they accept returns even on cut fabric. I hope others that have been skeptical aren't afraid to give them a try. I'm glad I did!