I haven't been to a quilting retreat yet but have gone to several scarp booking retreats. One I went to had a swap. People brought items they no longer used or wanted or bought then couldn't figure out why they bought it. Anyway the people that wanted to participate would bring their items. Say they brought 5 items they wanted to swap, they were allowed to pick out 5 items of like items they brought. Example someone brought an album. They would swap for a different item that would be close to an even swap. That way somebody that brought a small paper pack wouldn't be able to swap it for say die cut items. Or if everyone agreed they could do even swaps for whatever was brought. I hope this makes sense. It was a nice way to regime items no longer wanted for something "new" to them.
I posted this at 4:23 am so if it is confusing I'm going to blame it on not enough coffee!!