I recently saw a quilt top a lady had made from what appeared to be embroidery from all sorts of things...dishtowels, napkins, pillows, etc. She used a basic block size cut from the original items and used strips to join them. She used a bright red but I would have chosen something a little less bright as it seemed to distract from the nice, soft colors of the embroidered work. I recently made a baby pillow out of a damaged table runner by cutting off the damage, folded it in half and kept the blue birds for the front. It's a good thing to recycle all the work someone did.