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I dream of quilting someday... In the meantime I love to look at the fabrics on Spoonflower.com. Tons of gorgeous designs, always changing!

Usually Joanne Fabrics because it is the cheapest option (with coupons and/or sales) and usually when I decide to quilt I want to do it right.now. and not wait...

But sometimes I order from fabric.com

My best friend is an AMAZING quilter, and I asked her pretty much the same question a year or so ago. I'm just going to copy/paste her response to me because it was quite well thought-out!

Online Fabric Shops:

Hancock's of Paducah
http://www.hancocks-paducah.com/Category--Quilting-Fabric--m-06
This shop is located in Kentucky and is considered to be quilters Mecca. They have ALMOST EVERYTHING! This is either the best or the worst place to start depending on how brave you're feeling. The categories on the left will give you some indication as to what to look at and what to avoid (seasonal fabrics are probably not what you're looking for etc.) but it is a huge site that is easy to get lost in.
They also have patterns and books to look through here: http://www.hancocks-paducah.com/Category--Patterns-and-Books--m-10
Don't worry about terms like fat quarters, jelly rolls and layer cakes, these are terms for pre-cut fabric pieces which I can work with or without so don't feel limited by them.

The Fat Quarter Shop
http://www.fatquartershop.com/
This is also a huge site, but unlike hancock's they specialize in only quilting stuff and tend to be a little bit more inclined towards what are called modern quilts. Modern Quilting is not really avant-garde or anything, rather it tends to be into remaking vintage feeling stuff in a modern way, I think you might actually like a lot of it, more on about it later. If you scroll down on the left you'll also find patterns and books which might give you some ideas.

Sew Modern
http://shop.sewmodernonline.com/
This is a small shop located near me, they specialize in modern quilt fabrics, but they often have a lot of cute stuff and often times things that are difficult to find elsewhere. It's a smaller shop so it might be less intimidating as a starting place.

Grandma's Attic
http://webstore.quiltropolis.net/stores_app/Browse_dept_items.asp?Store_Id=411&Page_id=17&categ_id=10083&parent_ids=0,100
I have never shopped at this particular shop, and most of these fabrics can be found elsewhere, but I did want you to see these. These fabrics are reproductions from the 1930s and 1940s; since I know that you like vintage stuff I wanted to make sure that you saw these.

Fabric Lines:

-Fabric is produced by a bunch of different companies, most of which have a website where you can look but can't buy. These are great places for getting inspired, and once you know what you want it's not very difficult to find. Here are a few of my favorite brands:
Moda
http://www.unitednotions.com/un_main.nsf/mf_collections
Moda is one of the largest fabric distributors and have artists who design for just about every taste. The great thing about this page is that you can open up the swatch pages and see whole lines of fabric at once. Most people can then start to identify a couple of artists whose stuff they really like. Some of the fabric lines will also have free patterns which let you see the fabric all done up into a quilt.

Robert Kaufman
http://www.robertkaufman.com/
Kaufman is the other quilting giant in the world, again they have lots of different artists all designing different lines of stuff, there are patterns here too, so take your time and see if anything sparks your fancy.

In the Beginning
http://www.inthebeginningfabrics.com/displayfab/
In the Beginning is a much smaller operation, they have some really fantastic artists and some who do awful stuff, but their really great artists are REALLY great, so it's worth checking out.

Hoffman Fabrics
http://www.hoffmanfabrics.com/
Hoffman is the last of the big 3, they also have patterns to look at and their fabric lines here.

Inspiration:
Moda Bake Shop
http://www.modabakeshop.com/
This is always my first stop for inspiration. Moda made itself famous by being the first to produce pre-cut fabrics. These are things like Jelly Rolls (2 1/2" strips), Layer Cakes (12" squares), and Charm Packs (5"? squares). These make quilting EASY it saves tons of time and quilters love them because you can work a whole fabric line into a quilt without having to buy tons of different fabrics. The Moda Bake Shop is a place where quilters share the quilts and other goodies they've made from these pre-cut fabrics. It is both very inspiring, and a great way to see moda's fabrics sewn up into a quilt. The quilt here tend to be the deffnition of "modern quilting" - lots of bright/vintage colors with a lot of white. Since they have lots of different types of projects on the site, here is the link to the quilts: http://www.modabakeshop.com/search/label/Quilt There are tons of free patterns out here so do click through the older posts.
Lots of patterns can be found at the above stores, it's hard to say where exactly to go looking for these, at this point I mostly make my own. Lots of stuff can be found just with a google search for 'quilt patterns,' I'll attach below links to some that I like and books that I own/have worked from:
http://www.mkquiltdesigns.com/pattern%20pages/p-victorygarden.html
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_19?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=transparency+quilts&sprefix=transparency+quilts%2Caps%2C168 - This amazon search was for the first book, but the great thing is you can look inside any of the ones on this page
http://www.ctpub.com/showproducts.cfm?WPCID=1129 - This publisher has lots of e-books available which means you can peruse them online.
http://www.quiltinaday.com/shoponline/patterns.asp - Eleanor Burns' Quilt in a Day books and patterns are hugely popular with quilters, but often are more traditional in nature.
http://www.amybutlerdesign.com/mainmenu.php - Amy Butler has something of a cult following, on her page you can see her fabrics, her patterns as well as links to flicker pages of projects made out of her fabrics.
http://www.kaffefassett.com/Patchwork.html - Kaffe Fassett is another one with a cult following, but his stuff is really beautiful, check out a couple of his books and see if it's for you. It's a very specific look and I'm not sure it's yours, but there it is.

I get most of my quilting fabric at fabric.com. I love the selection and free shipping if you spend more than $35 (which I always do...).

Thought of a couple more: FabricWorm.com and Hawthorne Fabrics!