My First Fabric Haul

Diana here (aka GrannyD)

For about a dozen years, I worked at Lowe's Home Improvement Center here in town.  I managed the Paint and Home Decor Departments (paint, blinds, wallpaper, curtains, you get the picture).  So, one day I came around the corner and saw several vendors pushing two carts full of, well, sample curtains.  Turns out the Spring line was being put up and these were no longer needed.  I stopped dead in my tracks and, I swear to you, the spirit of my grandmother took over.
"Where are you going with all that?" I asked, trying to act like it really didn't matter.
"The trash," one of the vendor's answered.
I stood there for a moment and then shook my head.  "Um, no.  No, I don't think so."
"What would you like for us to do with them, then?" he asked.
"Why not just leave them here and let me take care of it?" I responded, still trying to keep my distance.
They looked at each other and shrugged.  "Whatever you say."

I hid those carts full of curtains (fabric) as well as I could until my shift was over all the time wondering what had possessed me.  I hadn't sewn a stitch since my girls were little.  And I certainly didn't have time to sew now.  But I knew I could not let that fabric (curtains) go to waste.
When my shift was over, I found as many boxes as I could, folded the curtains into them and took them home.  Where they sat.
For a couple of weeks.
Maybe a month.
Then,  one night, I was closing with one of my employees and saw her purse.  It was one someone had given her and the name on it was Vera Bradley.  I looked at it closely, just to see how it was made and that's when I knew what all of that fabric (curtains) I'd drug home was going to become.  It turns out curtains are made from really, really good fabric.
After that, every time the curtains changed out, I brought all of the samples home.  My daughter, you've already met her), helped me organize them in the closet but it's gone way, way beyond that.  Shhhh, don't tell her.  It got to the point that when the discontinued curtains were marked down, I was sometimes given the option, "If you take all of these, you can have them for .10 each."  What do you think I said?
This just goes to prove that will a little imagination and 'out of the box' thinking, you can find 'fabric' anywhere.