But lately it has started to feel a bit...excessive. When my credit card bill is usually 50% fabric purchases (ridiculous, I know. Damn you, Paypal!), and when I look at fabric websites every day, and when my husband joked that he could see six piles of fabric just from where he was sitting in the living room (and he was right! There were six!) I started to feel a bit overwhelmed by fabric buying.
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| This Cotton + Steel will be a bag. The mint arrows will be the outside of the bag (it is a canvas) and the pink (cotton) will be the inside. |
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| This Cotton + Steel print is one of my favourites. |
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| They bought me an entire bolt of batting. Fifteen yards of it. |
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| Purple unicorns from Far, Far Away by Heather Ross. My daughter saw it, took it and stole a pin from my sewing box to fashion a cape from this 1/2 yard. I think she loves it. |
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| More Pink Castle buys, courtesy of my husband who lost a bet and owed me fabric as a result. |
For me, the year is actually September to June (because I am a teacher) and not usually January to December. From September to June I would like to "shop my stash" and resist fabric purchases as much as possible. I have so much fabric I could make 20 quilts a year for five years and still have fabric to make more. That is getting to be a bit gluttonous, I think. I am committing to making quilts using mostly my (very large) stash until June 2015. I may buy fabric, but I won't prioritize new fabric over current fabric. I hope I can do it and I start to feel less like I am buying beyond what is reasonable.
On a final note, I happened across a blog post from From Blank Pages where she is very candid about her fabric addiction. I was already planning on this post but I felt like she really highlighted how my jokes about being "addicted" to buying fabric can be a real thing for some people. I have never hidden any purchases from my husband, nor have I ever been short of money for needs (like mortgage payments or what not) but I can see some of myself in her. Read it. Does it strike a cord in anyone else?
So, wish me luck! I plan on shopping my stash for the next few months and spending time sewing instead of shopping for fabric. Is anyone with me?
Lynn
As a fellow teacher, I totally understand the idea of the new year beginning in September! Yay for New Year's resolutions! I'm glad to hear you're not abandoning your Kona FQs (I suppose you would have done that after June's offering if you ever were!). Your resolution for yourself sounds very reasonable... you might even find that you enjoy sewing from your stash more than fabric shopping... less stress when you open the credit card bill! :)
ReplyDeleteI once did the calculation about how many quilts I would need to make in my lifetime to use all of my stash. It was an unreachable number so I conveniently forgot it. Certainly we should not put our home finances and needs in jeopardy because of fabric. On the other hand textiles, are a form of art. People spend thousands of dollars on a painting they place on the wall and it never changes. A stash is a fluid work of art and it brings enjoyment and pleasure just by stroking it and looking at it, even if it never gets "used up".
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