Don't get me started about FQs.

I have yardage of bubble gum pink of that stuff.

piney

The quilt shop has control over the 18" cut they make...and should measure at least 18" and not less. The 22" measurement will depend a lot on the fabric company. The shop is going to cut along the fold of the fabric. Sometimes one fabric can have a wider printed selvage than the other, so one half will have less usable fabric. Now days you really can't count on more than 18x20 for a fat quarter.

Most of the time now, I will buy 1/2 yard fabrics, and if I need a fat quarter, I can cut the fabric in half, or measure 22" if that is what I will be needing, and the rest of the fabric I can add to my stash for the scrap quilts I make most of the time.

Buying a full 1/4yd is almost always cheaper too, if you have a use for that ammount of material. Sometimes you only need a little of a particular piece.
I rarely buy fat quarters because of this problem.

If stores would actually sell these shorted pieces as what they actually are and for the right price I might indulge more but I always feel cheated when I do buy them.
peace

I refuse to buy another fat quarter! IF you get your 18x22 it cost way too much! I wash everything before using, Yes even fat quarters ( put them in a sweater bag to wash) about 1/2 of them came out not square! So to keep my blood pressure down, and my self happy I only buy yardage now.

Since most of my fabric is purchased without a pattern in mind, I usually buy yardage....I use fat quarters in scrappy projects of table runners, if I have them...

I only buy fat quarters at yard/estate sales at greatly reduced prices. And only if I absolutely love the patterns. It's just not worth it buying from the stores as there seems to be very little quality control in the cutting department.

I don't buy FQs any more either. When I first started quilting 4 or 5 years ago, I bought some FQ collections. Then when I have finally decided what to do with them, I find that the things I like to make need more than a FQ. So I stopped getting them. Now I buy at least a yard of whatever fabric I buy. When I made DGSs Turning Twenty, I cut my own FQs from the yardage I had collected, so glad I did because one or two FQs I tried to use were cattywumpus and not square enough to use. That turns out to be a big waste of valuable money. Maybe we, as the buying public, should boycott FQs entirely as a signal to the suppliers that we aren't going to tolerate an inferior product.

I am a worker at our LQS and we try to measure at least an extra quarter inch to make sure fat quarter is correct. At issue too is how the fabric comes off the bolt from the manufacturer. Sometimes it is very uneven and wrinkled and almost impossible to straighten. When that happens I try to cut extra generously. When cutting yardages for customers I always cut an extra inch or inch and a half.

some of that is not that shops fault as I was buying some fabric the other day I noticed how terrible it was wrapped on the bolt there was no way they could straighten it and it was something I realy wanted so I bought a fourth yard extra to have plenty I know a lot of our local quilt shops are struggling with the high cost of everything and also the internet and I really don't want to lose our local shops so I do try to do most of my shopping there and I understand the carelessness of the way some of this fabric is wrapped is not there fault

Fat Quarters
 

[QUOTE=Sunnie;5734974]I decided to use some of my scraps and Fat Quarters for mug rugs. So as I press each one I am noticing how poorly cut the FQs are. Most of them I picked up at quilt shows so no one to yell at. I have pressed 8 so far and not one is squarely cut so that by the time I square them up I no longer have a FQ. So never again!!!

I love fat quarters. I try and buy them from quilt shops as I can't usually buy much yardage at one. I have noticed in cutting them that some aren't what they are suppose to be. Instead of being the usual 18"x22"...some were a LOT smaller. I'm talking good quality fabric. Sometimes it doesn't matter beside the point I"m not getting what I paid for but when making something like a Turning 20 it can create a problem.