BarbaraSue

Other than fiber content causing a problem with ironing, the onlyother reason why some don't like poly is that poly may wash out the stain in color, but the odor can stay in the fabric. When it gets warm, the odor releases again. Can be worse than cotton.

Terricat

My mom goes to the used clothing store and buys bags of sweatshirts when they cost $2 a bag---she can stuff several sweatshirts into a brown bag. She cuts those into large squares of all different colors and makes a basic quilt. One of the churches in her town sends them off to overseas missions. The sweatshirts have been washed multiple times, of course, so they don't worry about shrinkage. Mostly they use flat sheets to back them, and I don't think they use batting. As you say, they aren't heirloom quilts, these are the type that get put to hard use for many different purposes. The church ladies will also set aside any polyester clothing items and make separate quilts of only all polyester fabrics.

Quilting Angel

Well, I've only been quilting for 10 months, and I am self taught. I just picked up that habit of only using 100% cotton from reading books, online and here.

GrannieAnnie

double knit is something from the past. Poly/cotton blend is used every day in many many ways.

GrannieAnnie

color me confused. How does a poly/blend cause ironing problems? The blended colors stay more true.

KARENBOUTQUILTIN

My mother use to take my sister and my polyester knit skirts and
cut them up for quilts when we out grew them. She made each of us
a quilt out of them using the 9patch block. I remember grandchildren
nieces and the rest of us saying, "I get the next one Nanny." My daughter even took one my mother made for a niece because it
was pink with her permission of course. Now I have a portion of one she started but passed before
finishing it. I have visited thrift stores looking for polyester knits to
finish it but I can't seem to find the material any more. I hope that I
get to complete it someday. BTW, they were really warm.

GrannieAnnie

the poly/cotton blends I've dealt with are about the same weight as 100% cotton. No big difference.

GrannieAnnie

What charity tells you what you will do? I use what I have and donate it. If they can't accept it, I guess that is their sin.

justflyingin

I agree. I sew a lot for our own charity (here in Poland) and give away the quilts to needy people in the area. I let one lady choose her quilts from among the ones I had. She CHOSE a completely 100% double knit polyester. I had finished it because someone gave me the quilt top. I hated even touching it, but it made a wonderful, heavy duty quilt.

My children assured me it wasn't so very ugly--in fact, they told me not everyone has the same feelings I do about doubleknit.

So, I too, don't necessarily understand your charity's rules. Poor people aren't quilt police. For sure.

The quilt will not "last 10 years" in any poor person's home--they will probably long have lost it, stained it, damaged it somehow, or had to leave it behind as they escape from a bad situation. At least that's what I think!

However, if your charity is one for soldiers or sick, then, they may actually cherish your quilt for years and years.

oldbalt99

Don't be put off with the whole quilter's material thing. True to your roots went out when the sewing machine was invented and busniess men set up swetshops. After that quilts were no longer for keeping people warm in beds but for show. Before that fabrics used were as inexpensive as possible. Some traditions, such as what passed in superiorly impovished areas, and this was not for show but to keep warm during the winter was taking apart clothes and pieceing them together has almost died out now. That was the birth if the scrap, and crazy quilt. My mother's mother one winter took all the wool winter coats her children had grown out of and made a couple of quilts from them. She tied them and used the lining to bind them.

When quilting came from England wool and silk were the fabrics of choice.

Personally I pefer the 60%cotton & 40% polyester blend I can get from sheets. I get more fabric for the money, but I've also used the mixed blend of fabric on the five yards for five dollars bolts, and the 100%cotton.
Use what you want and be happy. I've got four quilts and counting people are asking me to make.