Dividing the Reds

Lest you think I have forgotten the original task for the month - sorting, organizing and cleaning the sewing room - I am still dealing with a few things. At present, it's the reds.  

A few posts back I shared a picture of my fabric tubs lined up in the hallway. I'd moved them there to facilitate cleaning the stacks and piles of fabrics accumulating on my cutting table and other surfaces. 

These five tubs lived in the hallway for the better part of a week earlier this month. In the foreground is the tub devoted to that blue KF quilt I will return to as soon as Lucy is finished. Meaning this tub will stay close by and easily accessible.

Next are the green tub, the brown tub, and the white/neutral tub. I have tidied these and returned them to the closet. Tidying involves some refolding, restacking, and yes, revisiting all those luscious fabrics waiting to be turned into quilts. This whole process totally motivates me to sew-sew-sew!

While I was in the brown tub, next in order of full-ness to the reds, I pulled this combination of fabrics, and I've been dreaming of a quilt for them to become.

But I digress; today's topic is the red tub. 

At the far end of the hallway lineup is the red tub, a veritable riot of reds and far too many to snap the lid shut on the tub. This tub has camped in the hallway all month awaiting - what? I have been unable to  come up with a way to manage this situation.

I spent some time Thursday addressing all (all?) the issues, and have made progress. First, I took every bit of fabric out of the tub. I sorted large cuts from small cuts. I sorted dark reds from light reds. I separated burgundy-reds from red-reds. In handling all these fabrics so much, I discovered that I also have purply-reds and brown-reds. Some separation was necessary.

Here are some things that I removed.

The piece above looked too pink, so I intended to move it to a different tub (pink and purple). When I refolded it, I discovered that it was a half-yard cut of Paris Flea Market. Ha! I have a Jelly Roll of PFM, so this is still out and likely on it's way to a project tub.

This fabric was in the red tub, but just as easily could go in the blue tub. I have not moved it to any tub yet, because the thought occurred to me that it would be perfect for a backing on a patriotic quilt. So now, I am considering options for yet another project.

All of the fabrics above were in the red tub. See what I mean about brown-red and purply-red? These are stacked together and I think another project has been born. I know they do not necessarily 'match-match,' but they go together well enough for a quilt. And believe it or not, I already have a quilt in mind for these. Awesome!

This stack also came from the red tub, and honestly, I do not know what to do with these. What a mish-mash. I will let them sit out for awhile as I work on other things. Perhaps an idea will niggle its way to my brain. Two of these have already been used in quilts, so they could go into the scrap-cutting stack. Thinking...hmmmm...

The red tub that went back into the closet looking like this. Neatly folded and easy to identify. Bonus: the lid snaps shut. Looks pretty good, right?

From the reorganizing described in this single post, let me tally up how many new or pending projects were born: 1, the brown grouping; 2, Paris Flea Market; 3, something patriotic; 4, the purply-red grouping. Four. Four potential quilts on the horizon, in addition to those listed on my 2021 goals.

I'm good with that.

Happy Quilting, Friends!