I was recently asked if I would talk a bit about how I store my scraps. It has been years since I shared any information around scrap management so I thought I would write a few posts over the next couple weeks.
First, I think it is important to give some thought as to how you use your scraps. In other words, are you someone who always uses patterns that call for standard sizes like mini charms, charm squares or strips. If so, you may want look at how Bonnie Hunter stores her scraps. She pre-cuts all of her scraps to standard sizes.
I will admit, I tried this system in the beginning but it just did not work for me. Whenever I wanted to make a quilt, it seemed all the scraps I wanted to use were cut to the wrong size.
One of the first thing I realized about myself, is that I like all of my fabric sorted by color - including my scraps! I tend to work in color combinations - so I just need to pull the relevant color bins when I start on a quilt.
I also think it is important to sort your scraps immediately once they are identified as scraps. So right above my cutting table, I have a shelf with some color coded buckets that I drop scraps into every time I clean off my cutting table. You may not have this luxury but you should be able to come up with some bags, shoeboxes or even glass jars to store your scraps in.
The nice thing about having these scraps so handy is I can usually dig through them and find a scrap that will work when I need some little bit for a project.
If your scraps are easy to use, you will use them!
Sometimes, when I finish cutting a project that I really like the fabric combinations I used, I don't want to break up the leftovers back into their respective colors. A good example is the leftover fabric and scraps from my All that Jazz quilt I recently finished. I really want to take these leftovers and add a few more scraps and make another quilt in these colors. In this case, I simply bag up all the leftovers/scraps and store them together in a drawer.
Here are a few other projects that reside in the drawer from years ago. Note that I don't put a lot of "universal" fabric in these bags. They are usually genre specific (30's, holiday, flannel, cross weaves) or they are odd color combinations.
When I want to start something new, I will dig through these bags and see if I get inspired by any of them. They give me a starting point. Now I just need to pull from my color bins of scraps to enhance the fabric that is already pulled.
