kydeb

It has to be pretty small for me to give it up!! Usually, if I can get 2 quarter-inch seams and a quarter inch will show, I toss it in my scrap box. Anything big enough that it can be cut into a usable piece gets cut up and put in drawers by sizes. It literally hurts me to throw a piece of fabric away!

ILoveToQuilt

I'm SOOOOO bad. If it's less than a 6" piece, I use it as kindling in my wood stove (100% cotton only). Fabric works better than twigs I found and leaves no ash. I was told this trick by a fellow quilter. I know, I know....what a waste of good fabric. I don't have the room to store all the snips and strings (even under my beds are full of fabric!) so I have to compromise somewhere. (BTW - the chimney sweep has says that burning cotton fabric will not hurt the wood stove nor the chimney - just make sure it is 100% cotton. Polyesters can melt while cotton burns).

Anita

Betty Ruth

We must be sisters. I have a hard time throwing any scrap away, although my husband has been urging me to throw away my tub of crumbs and start afresh.* I am making an effort not to add to that particular tub of scraps. If I can get a 2 1/2 inch square, that gets cut and put in a box for scrappy 4 patch or 9 patch. strips an inch (or nearly so) wide are saved for my next string qulit.

String quilts were my mother's favorite. She used worn out sheets for the base, but I usually use old dryer sheets. Has anyone noticed how those dryer sheets have shrunk? I can only get 5 in. squares without piecing them.

fireworkslover

Anything 3/4" wide, or larger I keep. All my thread snipets and smaller pieces first go in a plastic container and when that's full, I dump it in a big Ziploc bag. I've been participating in Superior University and they said at the beginning to save all your scraps and threads for a project later. So I have been saving. I'm thinking it'll be a make your own fabric with wash away interfacing.

maviskw

Who says you have to make 1/4 inch seams? 3/16 and 1/8 inch seams work too. The smaller the pieces are, the smaller I make the seams. That way, I can use a 1/2 inch strip and make two 1/8 in. seams. You do have to have good fabric to do this though, but it's only the really good fabric that I can't bear to throw away.

Holice

I save everything even the litle strips from straightning up fabric and then give them to groups who do weaving and other craft projects. I have groups that work with children in art classes. I sort in bags. A teacher friend has a class in rug weaving. She welcomes the narrow strips. I use larger strips for string quilts for Charity. Nothing is tossed.

Caroline S

I thought it was just me, dryer sheets have shrunk. I save every little scrap also. One of my goals is to use up my three totes of crumbs to make a "crumby" quilt. But that is after I finish the three quilt projects up on the design board.

QultingaddictUK

I am your clone, that is exactly what I do and I don't call it miserly but being sensible. As one well known quilters said the scraps and snippets of fabric cost exactly the same as a yard!

barri1

Thanks for the advice on what to do with the small pieces that are too small to be used in a quilt.. If I sew the tiny strips, and pieces end to end, I can make a ball, and crochet, or weave them into something else. Right now I am cutting up 2.5" squares, and getting frustrated with all the wasted fabric. I can use the 1.5" or more for swaps, and postage stamp quilts, but feel like I am wasting the scraps after that. This idea might work very well for my head..

JeanieG

I also try to follow Bonnie Hunter's Scrap User System. Here is a link to the information on her website:

http://quiltville.com/scrapusersystem.shtml