Color catcher sheets are designed to attract any dye molecules floating around in the wash water, in theory.

The germs and resistance theory is one theory.

I spent over three months on a burn unit, so I am not an expert but I was taught a lot about germs in the environment.

Another theory, the one the burn unit nurses taught me, is that using antibacterial products helps breed resistant strains of bacteria by killing off the weaker bacteria and leaving only the strongest to reproduce.

Additionally, the vast majority of bacteria in the average home are either neutral for humans or actually good for humans. These neutral and good bacteria compete with the bad (for humans) bacteria and help crowd them out. If you kill off all the bacteria in the environment, you are creating a risk that what re-colonises the area will be mostly bad bacteria.

Exactly!

Well, I'm allergic to cats and dust mites, so I guess if someone gave me a quilt I would prefer the dander off it. I'm still sticking with my theory that washing it after it's done makes it nice, puffy, and soft.

I wash. The Quilts of Valor that I make are required to be washed owing they are often going into a hospital setting. I prefer the crinkled look myself.

I wash bed quilts and baby quilts. I don't wash wall hangings. To me, baby quilts look best all soft and cuddly and it also makes the quilting more obvious.

I always wash first. It gets more of the sizing out of the fabrics, and also removes and dust, lint, animal hairs, etc. accumulated during the making process. None of us has a perfectly clean house!! Certainly not me!! :-)[/quote]

You peeked!

I'm sure this has been answered already, but just in case, my preferred method is to use the wool setting on my front-loader washing machine and no washing detergent. This is a very gentle approach. I hate hand-washing, so that's just not gonna happen.

I dry the batting on an indoor clothes airing rack. I wouldn't dare use the drier.

Where do you find the color catchers? Is this something you have to get at the quilting shops, or can you find them somewhere like Wal-Mart?

You can buy them at Walmart or most grocery stores. At my WalMart they are around the fabric softener sheets. The ones I get here are Shout Color Catcher in a small red box about 1 1/2" thick by 6" long with the Shout logo and a multi colored bullseye target on it. There are 24 to a box. I know there are other brands, but this is what I was able to get. They certaintly seem to work for me.

Thank you! I appreciate your help! :c)

Donna