OK, another question. Is it more useful/versatile to organise based on colors (red/blue/green...) or value (darks/lights)?

If anyone feels the need to produce small scrapes they should make a watercolor quilt that ends up with 1" squares (cut 1.5"). One of my daughters LOVES Monet and I decided to make her a rendition of his garden. Since it was designed using a Monet calendar, several art books.... you get the idea..... there was no pattern. I bought tons of 8" strips off of bolts (at one JoAnn's that was moving and had a great sale I had in my cart 20 bolts to be cut; the clerk gasped and I told her "You people make us into addicted quilters so don't complain!" That got a lot of laughs from the others in line.

But the point is, if you are designing it as you go along, you make a lot of changes and there may be some flower design (or water, or... ) that doesn't fit at all, and many of the squares you cut up and place for consideration you never use at all. The result is that I have a plastic box for odds and ends with several hundred 1.5" squares!!! I hope to use them, but they probably will be given away after I die :). But the quilt did win a first prize of Viewers Choice for Original Wall Art (at a fairly large 3 barn show), AND my daughter feels like she got the best quilt ever. I did do another quilt of 1" squares but it was a baby quilt and I used tiny pictures in a lot of it (like Big Red, or bugs, or ...) and could use only a few of the Monet squares LOL.

My larger scraps (smaller than a fat quarter) are kept in plastic bin drawers like others described, uncut because I do pictorial quilts often and use scraps when I can.

I would absolutely always organize based on color. When I need to use a piece, I am always looking for a particular color, not on a color value. I never say "I need a dark color for this Christmas runner." I say, "I need a green for this Christmas runner."

i "organize" my scraps into a 3 drawer bin, small (up to about 2"), medium (2-4") and large (5-8"). Then larger scraps get folded and put in another bin according to color or theme. I hate to cut up anything until I know exactly what size I'm going to need. Clear as mud?? Maybe, but it makes sense to me. LOL!!!

I find it very easy for my scraps to take over my room, so a group of us bought a baby Go Cutter (I love it) and every now and then I sit down and use it to cut my scraps into 5" squares or 3 1/2" squares or triangles. They all fit neatly into a plastic shoe box labeled 5" squares and so on. Then when I want to make a quilt I am ready to go! I still have a ton of scraps they grow in the dark....

I use your choices plus (because I LOVE Log Cabins) strips 1 1/2" x 1 1/2", 1 1/2" x 2 1/2" .... up to 1 1/2" x 9 1/2". The log cabin strips are my first cutting choice and are separated into darks & lights.

"Odd" scraps are used as leaders, then tossed. Unless they are 2 1/2" wide: those are sewn together to eventually be a doll-baby-bed quilt for DGD. :)

One question - do you press your scraps before you cut them? And, if you cut into strips, do you press them before you use them?

I just sort them by color and type. I don't cut them at all first. Since I don't know what I'm going to use them for I don't want to wind up with only small pieces of fabric when I need a larger piece. I know that the famous quilters don't do this, except for Eleanor Burns. Most of them cut them up into smaller squares and strips. I think Eleanor just puts them in bins and stores them until she wants to use them. You may want to listen to them instead of me.

I'm really laughing. There were a couple of very generous board members that shipped me out their scraps. I am in love. First I went through them, and cut off pieces to make 1.5" squares for my PSQ. While I was doing that, I cut a pieces for a friend, and shipped them out to her. Then I looked at them, and smiled. As soon as I couplete a four quilt unity project, I will use the scraps in a bunch of quilts, swaps, and donate lap quilts made from them. I am having such a great time with them. I don't own yardage.

I am halfway in between lol... I started out doing the Bonnie Hunter method... but then decided that 1.5 inch squares and strips were NOT my thing lol. HOWEVER... I have had all sorts of friends give me scraps... some are HUGE pieces, some are strips. I am TRYING to sort them into bins, but at the same time, I am thinking that I need to somehow sort by color as well. If I live to be 200, I think I could still be sewing JUST using scraps. Lots of great ideas here!!!