One of the groups of fabric that I want to use up are the scraps of big florals that I've used for borders or setting blocks over the years. Some of them are gorgeous indeed, but the patterns are hard to use in smaller pieces.

Included in this collection of perplexing scraps are the 5" squares from charm packs, which usually have a feature fabric of a large floral or paisley. These are just tiny snippets of an allover large design, and sometimes you can only imagine what the whole thing looks like. Small squares with random huge flowers, or parts thereof don't exactly inspire a lot of ideas.

I was looking through my saved pictures, and suddenly realised that this pattern might be  a really good way to use those awkward prints. I can't remember where I saw this- it has NY study group on it but they seem more modern now. Anyway, I started cutting the charm prints into 4 1/2" squares,  made a few connecting blocks, and I was on my way.

After making a few of the Puss in the Corner blocks I realised I could also find a place for some other hard to use reproduction scraps, strange stripes and large dark florals that were big enough to be cut into the 1 1/2 by 2 1/2 " pieces I needed.  You really need yardage for some stripes to work well in borders or fussy cutting and I had scraps and odd bits that were too small for either. Even a fat quarter of something like this Jinny Beyer print isn't really useful unless you want to do some fancy cutting and tweaking.

However these stripes were exactly the right size to cut a 2 1/2" stripe, which was then cross cut into 1 1/2" slices. Likewise these stripes were chopped up and became the darks for the chain blocks.

I was so pleased to find a way to use these scraps,

and I felt even more virtuous about the fabric disappearing into this project.

In the box of border scraps were the bits from mitred corners, and wherever possible I sewed these together so that I could cut a square from them.

Most of the patterns are so busy you can't notice that seam anyway. More bits gone!

I decided I preferred it set straight instead of on point like the original, and I've sewed together about 1/4 of the blocks I'd previously cut . I was enjoying the half empty container of scraps, but then  Keryn gave me all the squares from her charm packs that she didn't want, so  I've got a lot more cutting to do!