How do you manage your scraps?

For those of you who like crafting with fabrics, I have some questions.

Do you intentionally manage your scraps?
What do you keep and how do you keep it?
When do you throw something away?

With my growing interest in patchwork and quilting, I'm realising that even the smallest of fabric scraps can be used to great effect in projects big and small, and that I should use up every last bit of fabric or preserve it for further projects down the track.

The reuser/recycler in me is in absolute agreement. The romantic/creative in me thinks of all the Depression-era women making stunning quilts out of discarded undergarments and nods her head.

The lazy, disorganised crafter in me thinks 'too hard, just bin it!' and 'I'm SO over that fabric I can't use another jot of it' and 'I could always buy scrap bundles or charm packs if I need them'. Particularly when I see something like this scrap below, which is a fabric I've never liked (I didn't buy it!), has already been hacked into and is a horrid mess:

(See below for its fate... it has not gone to waste).

SO... what am I doing about my scrap issues? Taking a challenge or two, of course, and setting myself some scrap-management ground rules which will hopefully serve me and my patchwork obsession well for the long term.

Well, here are the ground rules I'm setting myself:

1. Thou shalt not hoard. Buy fabric for specific projects and use it up with pleasure! Fabric will always be available: if I like something particular I can probably chase it down when I need it or if not, find something else I like. There is no fabric shortage at present. I will not miss out.

2. Keep anything from a fat eighth or bigger neatly folded in your cupboard, in size piles. Ha ha ha.

3. Cut and sort smaller pieces into the following categories: 

a. 5" or 6" squares and rectangles 

b. Strips (any length but no thinner than 2.5")

c. Scraps that could be used to make 1" hexagons or 2" squares (e.g. pieces approx. 3" high and wide)

d. Scraps that can be used for 1/2" hexagons (e.g. pieces at least 1.5" high and wide)

Everything else that is left is allowed to go into the bin with a clean conscience.

My scrap sorting is pretty specific, isn't it? That's because I'm joining in with this:

 

This piece-along gives me a real motivation to carefully look after my scraps. In fact, I'm kind of joining in twice. 

I'm committing to a 2" hexagon charm quilt, which will require 297 hexagons in unique fabrics (if I want to make a 50" x 60" throw). I'd like to see this pieced by the end of 2010. A 2" hex can be cut from a 5" square, and I've cut 30 so far - Kate, most of these are from the scrap pack you sent me, thanks SO much!

I've also opted to cut 1" hexagons while I'm at it. I prefer the look of 1" hexagons in a quilt, but after cutting out the 60 pieces below, I realised that I might struggle to cut, baste, piece and quilt 1,173 hexagons in unique fabrics within, say, the next decade. So I'll just add to this lot slowly. Maybe I'll end up with a charm cushion, maybe I'll throw a few on a skirt, maybe they'll be discovered by a great-granddaughter who will lovingly make them into a dolly-quilt.

And - just because I'm going a bit mad with all the scrap possibilities at this point - I'm cutting up those really little, annoying scraps of just over an inch in width and adding them to my 1/2" hexagon scrap bucket. 

Here are the scraps from that horrid pink fabric... I know they'll look great once they're blended in with other tiny hexagons in some form or other.

Maybe even in another cute Dear Fii brooch:

OK. So I have a bit of a hexagon thing going on. 

You might not be hexagon obsessed. But how do you manage your scraps? I'd love to know.