Adding to stash.....
 

Hubby and I will be going on vacation next week and we will be traveling through several states. I have a few quilt stores marked on my list that I want to visit...my question is...how do you keep from buying material that is already in your stash? I have a habit of falling in love with material all over again when I am in a new shop,lol. Thanks for any ideas.

You could take lots of pictures. Some people actually cut a little bit off each piece. I find that I usually remember what fabric I have, although I don't remember how much.

thank you! I thought of the pictures but my camera is on the blitz and I can't see my phone pics well enough. I will cut off a corner of the fabric and use those small ziplock bags and group them by color. If I have any doubt about the material I can check.

I'd attach them to index cards, punch a hole in the cards and slip them onto one of those rings that open and close. Might be easier than rummaging through all those bits and pieces in a baggie. I also saw a suggestion to slip them into the pockets of small photo albums. That would make them easy to carry and easy to thumb through.

Before my stash got out of hand, I would take a small strip and glue it to a piece of ruled paper on each line. I then put the amount of yardage for that piece next to it. It was nice, because as I looked at patterns at night in front of the TV, if I saw a quilt I wanted to make, I looked at the strips to see if I had anything I could use for that quilt, if there was enough, and if I had anything to coordinate with it. I tried to keep the colors sorted before I glued them on, at first.

I make a mental inventory of what I want to look for before I go. When I go in a couple of weeks I want to look for a set of fat quarters - maybe 28 - 40 of them to make a quilt. Do I need lights, etc. I haven't run into the problem of buying fabric I already have. I have a tendency to buy what I can't get in my area.

Make notes of "holes" in your stash.. what are you missing.. colors, designs, patterns, backing fabrics. Once you decide what to "hunt" for it makes it easier to resist the "pretty bolt".

There is a smartphone app called Fabric Stash that allows you to take a couple of pics of each piece of your fabric, list how much you have, where you bought, even a part for the pattern you are using whichever fabrics in and your thread and notions. I love it because I don't have to cut my fabric and worry about keeping up with my cards. Wasn't more that $4-5 and I love it!!

I would besides the photo album stashing put in colour families. You will at that stage also see gaps.
If you have a enormous stash only take those pieces from fabric over 2/3 yards.

oh, thank you! I like the thought of the small photo album. that would be super easy.

Thank you. This is a great idea. I have been picking up fat quarters, etc. here and there of the reproduction flour sack prints and also the reproduction civil war prints. I am a fairly new quilter and my stash isn't that large yet. I thought the other day that I would start making project bags...take a gallon size bag..find a pattern and then start collecting fabric to go with the pattern. That way, it would all be all together as a "kit" for when I was ready to do the project. With this method, I would know what I need automatically.

thank you! that is a great idea also. I was in a quilt store the other day and the owner told me that if you don't have a project in mind, that is always good to just buy "blenders"

thank you! I have lots of holes right now,lol.

thank you!!!!!

thank you. I am fairly new...no enormous stash,lol...trying to prevent that with this craft...I have a tendency to craft hoard,lol