I've done something very rash . . . .

I may live to regret this. Right now I'm feeling quite guilty. I thought I'd feel like a weight had lifted from my shoulders, but I don't. Maybe I will eventually - I hope so!

So . . . what is this terrible thing I've done? I've thrown out my crumbs. Totally thrown them out. They are in the garbage can by the curb waiting for tomorrow's pick-up.

Let me start at the beginning. I was taking a break from quilting by standing at the ironing board pressing scraps for cutting into squares, strips, bricks. I've been pressing and cutting for quite some time now, and have drastically reduced the number of scraps that are not in usable form. While I was pressing I started thinking about all the boxes and drawers of scraps already cut waiting for me to do something with them. I can't begin to imagine how many quilt tops I could make from those scraps - enough to keep me sewing for at least a year or two without ever touching anything else in my stash. As I was ironing I was also setting aside little pieces to go in the crumb drawer. The drawer that was still more than 3/4 full even though I sewed 1016 crumb chaos blocks last year. Hundreds of crumbs waiting for me to make Bonnie-style crumb quilts. I looked at those crumbs, and looked at all the scraps waiting to be cut, and looked at all the scraps already cut, and thought to myself "This is ridiculous!" Then and there I resolved to cut nothing smaller than 1 1/2" squares and triangles about that same size. The rest I would toss. That thought was quickly followed by another extreme - at least for me - thought. If I'm not going to save any more crumbs then why save the ones I already have. I certainly have enough to do without working with those. So, before I could change my mind, I took a plastic sack from the garage and dumped all the crumbs into it and then into the garbage can. As I was doing so I noticed some were probably big enough to cut a tiny square or triangle from, but I refused to allow that. I wanted them gone - I didn't want to have to deal with any of them.

So - am I going to miss those crumbs? No. Am I going to run out of things to sew without them? Hardly. Do I have an unlimited place to store stuff? No - I've already filled that drawer with something else.

Then why do I feel so guilty? I know why - because I hate wasting things. Even when I think it was the right thing to do.