Sublime Text does not register a sass variable ($variable) as a single item when highlighting, so when I double click on the name, it highlights the word, but does not include the $-symbol in the highlighting. Visual Studio, on the other hand, selects the $-symbol along with the variable name when double clicking on a variable to select it.
I write sass all day long, and it could make my life drastically easier if I could modify this small behavior. Is there a way to change this? I am sure it would be possible with a plugin, but I don't know if one exists or how to find it.
There is a setting named word_separators which provides a list of characters that are assumed to not be part of a word for the purposes of things like double click selection, navigating by words, and so on.
The default for that particular setting is set to the following, which includes the $ character that is causing you woes:
// Characters that are considered to separate words
"word_separators": "./\\()\"'-:,.;<>~!@#$%^&*|+=[]{}`~?",
You can modify this setting to not include the $ character so that it's treated as a part of the identifier, which should do what you want.
In order to ensure that you don't experience any other knock-on effects of this, you may want to set the setting in the preferences specific to the Sass syntax.
To do that, you can select Preferences > Settings - Syntax Specific while you have a Sass file open and focused, and then copy the default setting into those settings and remove the $ character.