How to save money on QUILTING for long time quilters

Saving money on quilting boils down to three things, use what you have, buy only what you need and pinch your pennies when you do buy. Here’s a list of ways to do just that.

1. Use your scraps. For ideas on how to organize your scraps read this post by Bonnie Hunter.
http://quiltville.com/scrapusersystem.shtml

2. Use those ugly and “what was I thinking of” fabrics for backings.


3. Make a challenging quilt. It will take longer to make the quilt so you fabrics will last longer and you will have fun learning something new and stretching yourself.


4. Don’t buy a new magazine until you’ve used a pattern from an old one.


5. Don’t buy a new pattern until you’ve used one you already have.


6. Join a quilting guild if you haven’t already, you’ll have lots of quilting fun for very little money.

7. If your quilting guild has an auction,donate, attend and bid. The members of my quilting guild donate their unwanted items and most of them are sold for under retail. If your guild doesn’t have an auction, suggest having one. It’s a great fund-raiser and lots of fun.

8. Check out Quilter’s Flea Market, it’s a great place to sell unwanted quilting items and buy some new-to-you things for a less than new price. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/QuiltersFleaMarket/


9. Shop your stash - see Stashbusters online group for lots of great ideas to use your stash.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stashbuster/


10. Finish your UFO’s and WIP’s. Unfinished projects are a BIG money waster. Remember, it’s not a quilt until it’s quilted!



Please leave a comment with your favorite way(s) to stretch your quilting dollars, we all will appreciate it.

MONEY & QUILTING

Quilting has become an expensive hobby. If you make a large quilt you are probably going to use 15-20 yards of fabric, a batting, thread and needles. Then there are the non-consumable supplies that you need to have, the rotary cutter and mat, pins, books and patterns.
I’ve been quilting for a long time so I have lots of tools, some of which I’ve never used…ouch, and LOTS of fabric. I have a huge stash of quilting fabrics and I’m glad I have them now because as gas and food prices rise my budget for non-necessities is shrinking.

I recently read a blog post on how to save money quilting written by a non-quilter. While I agree with some of her ideas I don’t agree with all of them, and I think that her list is more relevant to the new quilter than the person who’s been quilting for a long time. If you’d like to read it this is the link:

http://www.quiltingandpatchwork.com/2008/06/20/10-ways-to-save-money-quilting/

The things I, as an established quilter do to save money on quilting will be different than the person just starting out.

So I’m going to write a couple of posts on money saving ideas for quilters. The first will be for those of us who have a “stash”, the second will be for the new quilter.
If you have any money saving ideas please post a comment and share your idea with the rest of us. I think we’ll all have to learn to be more frugal if we are going to be able to continue to pursue our hobbies as the price of gas continues to rise and takes a bite out of our budgets.