Amma, that sounds really interesting. There are some quite beautiful hankies out there that I have been looking at today. I don't have that many of them and I do like the idea of cutting them into quarters to make them go further.
I was looking at some all white hankies with pretty embroidery, cutwork, etc. and thought how nice those would be on a light blue background.
eBay sure has a bunch of hanky lots, vintage and repros. They are so pretty and reasonably priced for the repros.