Before I left I was determined to get all those boxes of scraps sorted into piles and stored correctly.  It took hours, and I was more than a little sick of it by the end, but I persevered.  I reduced the containers to this; 2 boxes of genuine strings, and two boxes of pieces to send through the Go Cutter and cut into strips straight away.

There were lots of small pieces that I couldn't decide on right away, so they are now stored in those wire baskets against the wall, waiting for me to come up with a project to use a few of them.

I stopped using Bonnie's Scrap User system a while ago, but recently it's occurred to me that it would be good to stack the strip drawers again.  Not with 2.5"strips, because I rarely use that size, but the 3.5"and 1.5" drawers would be really useful.  I seem to use those sizes all the time, and it would be great to have a stock of strips at hand.  The 1.5" strips can be cut with the Go Cutter, and I will use the Shape Cut to do the 3.5"ones. 
 After I'd cleared the surfaces I tipped out two huge tubs of orphan blocks, and tried to stocktake what I have. 

A LOT, is the answer.  Most blocks aren't orphans as such.  I always make too many blocks, so I can pick and choose what goes into the finished quilt, but I didn't realize how much of a habit it was until I saw them all in one place. Some blocks are singles, but most are multiples. How many quilts are in this bunch?

I sorted them all into piles, then bagged them in plastic bags with a note saying how many blocks, and sometimes the size.  It took hours and hours, and I can only wonder at what makes me make 7 extra blocks for nearly every quilt.  I guess I must like sewing them, if I have that many spare.

 The yellow box on the left contains the blocks with the most multiples, the black box is small blocks and units that I can build bigger blocks out of, or use as fillers if I do an Orphan quilt.  The orange box is all the single blocks.  It doesn't look like much, but it's a big stack.  Not in this photo are all the really big pieces, that measure around 24"square.  I can use them as the centres of medallions, or finish them as small quilts. I'll pull them out later when I have a bit of spare time.

And I found two small pieces, that are already finished.

This one used to be in a frame, but I took it out to quilt it and never got round to it.  It's all fussy cut from one border stripe fabric.  I might just put it back in a frame, I don't know that quilting would actually enhance it.

This one is a miniature copy of a quilt, from an English book I think, I'll have to rummage around and find it. The little four-patches are only an inch across, I had fun with this.  It will definitely benefit from being quilted, and displayed on a doll's bed. 

It will be an afternoon's work to get this finished.  Strange how some things just never get dealt with, until finally it's done in no time at all.