A HUGE Change

 In the ongoing tidying of the quilting room, I have made a small change that has provided maximum impact. The action detailed here has yielded a couple of positives, actually.

For about 10 years now, I have had my grandmother's sewing kit sitting next to my sewing table. I rarely need to get into the kit for anything, but lately when I've needed more specific thread color, I've checked the vast thread supply in her kit. 

Click here to see the kit opened up; click here to see more detailed pics of the contents.

Lately, whenever I touch Grandma's kit, a piece of veneer peels off. It's been loose, but now whatever glue was under there is completely gone, and the veneer is coming off in large strips. Not wanting to cause any further damage, I selected what I considered to be the most treasured items from Grandma's kit to store elsewhere. Then I and put her kit away until I figure out how to go about repairs. And yes, those pieces of veneer were saved for the eventual repair.

This brings me to benefit #1: with her kit out of the way, I have opened up some space in my quilting room. I will try really hard not to fill that space with new piles of "stuff." 

Let me show you how I am dealing with the treasures I removed from Grandma's sewing kit.This is benefit #2 - displays as opposed to dusty piles. Another benefit of cleaning the sewing room is that I now have tidy, clean spaces for display purposes! Who'd have ever thought that was a possibility?!!?

For years, I've had a refurbished dresser behind Sharon's sewing table. And for years, the dresser top has been nothing more than a catch-all. I kid you not - there has been the unfinished parts of a tote bag on that dresser top gathering dust for about 4 years. The depth of the dust on this project was staggering; I'm still sneezing. 

This is a before/after composite of the dresser. Stored here are myriad craft items for anything NOT related to quilting.

No more dusty mess atop this dresser! Now, this dresser top is all spiffed up with these apothecary jars full of Grandma's goodies.

I intend to write at least one more post about the benefits of cleaning my quilting room. I am not yet ready to show anyone the top of my cutting table, but scrap management is ongoing. I won't ever get it 100% done, but I am making progress.

Happy Monday, Dear Friends, and Happy Quilting!

A Daunting Task

It all began with a search in my sewing room for one particular fabric. If you recall, in my attempt to make progress on Lake Effect, I needed to make more hexies. I found the necessary fabrics and went to work making a few hundred more. 

However, one fabric in particular was missing from the collection and believing it was necessary to include it, I began a basic search of my sewing room.

Arrow points to fabric I am trying to find.

 

You know, searching comes in a couple of different forms. One is the basic glance through this or that tub, or in this or that little pile which usually results in finding the desired item. I did this type of searching for about three days. I'd look for awhile, then stop, moving on to other tasks. But my mind continued pondering possible places I could have put the piece of fabric. 

Because you know about me, my fabric stash and my penchant for keeping all scraps, I wouldn't have thrown it out, and I am sure I didn't use it for any other project.

So I returned, tackling previously unsearched places.

By the third or fourth day, I was driving myself crazy trying to find this fabric, and that is when the simple search ended up becoming so much more. I was becoming really agitated with the fruitlessness of my searching. 

Note the sprinkling of the dark print.

And so the next-level searching began. We are talking deep, dig-in-the-back-of-the cupboard  and pull-out-all-the-tubs stuff here, folks. I am finding things that have been buried for decades.

And no, I have not found the fabric I was looking for. 

 

However, all is not lost. I have accomplished something significant - my sewing room is getting some long-avoided attention. It both thrills me to be tackling this, but also overwhelms me to accept the reality and impossibility of beginning new projects alongside those that need finishing (UFOs). 

For proof that progress is being made, I will share this tub full of empty tubs. Formerly, all these contained miscellaneous items - fabric, projects, remnants from projects, etc. I consolidated huge amounts of items; in other words, I actually dealt with them. Instead of a temporary plastic tub for a home, I moved things to the real home - what a novel idea! Years of stop-gap measures have been corrected for the long-term solutions. 

I intend to explain with more depth a few of these in future posts.

And yes, I know, the truly long-term solutions involve FINISHING what I start!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Wreck of A Quilting Room

On more than one occasion have I bemoaned the deplorable state of my sewing space. It just isn't in me to be a neat freak, apparently. 

In analyzing this I believe the problem lies with my never putting anything away when I finish a project. I just move on to beginning the next project, and pile the old stuff up at the end of the table or in a tub on the floor. 

On top of that, because I have so many ideas and a frenetic attention span, I grab patterns or fabrics to consider various future options and, of course, these are never put away; no! Just add to the mess!

The view above is pretty much the exact view Sharon has from her table. The last time she was here, I promised her that I would have those 3 tubs plus overflow of Kaffe fabrics cleaned up and put away. Instead, I got into the patterns (see this post), and made a bigger mess by leaving the doors open and even more stuff on the floor. 

A closer view of this bit of the chaos lets you see that it would not take a whole lot of time or effort to tidy this and put it away. The top tub, above, is missing a lid which is surely buried somewhere in this room.

Now, let's turn our attention to the desk - this (above) is to my right if I'm sitting at the machine. I swear, if I pile on one more thing, it will topple over and create an even more critical situation. 

My new idea: take 15-20 minutes daily to tidy just one small area. 

One. Small. Area. 

My first tidy session dealt with the Kaffe tubs. I found the missing lid  buried in that wobbly pile on the desk; yes, my second tidy session was attacking the pile on the desk. 

The Kaffe tubs are stacked in the closet, and the doors are shut. I also returned those many bags to the closet. The items in the foreground are 4 finished quilts packaged up and ready for delivery to friends and relatives. These will disappear as I make plans to see them.

The random papers stacked here comprise much of that chaos shown up above. I need to get out all my notebooks and plastic sleeves. The papers all have proper homes when I make myself file them. And that leads to this next part.

The downside to trying to get a handle on the mess is that while tidying one area, the need to access an entirely different area is frequently necessary - and you guessed it - that area is a disaster, too.

 My filing system: 3-ring binders with specifically labeled categories. (The 'Coms1010' notebook needs to be labeled - leftover from DD2s college days.)

I will - I promise! - continue to make an effort at chaos control. I just cannot allow this dishevelment to go on any longer. I will let you know how it goes. So far, two tiny areas are looking a whole lot better!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Clean Table

While Sharon quilted on the Tin Lizzie  (see last post), I was determined to clean off my cutting table. And I did. I don't mind showing you the before and after photos of this long-overdue task.

This table is at least 6' long, and I have covered the far two-thirds of it with stacks and piles of stuff that need to be put away. The 20-30 inches of available cutting space is not nearly enough  room to be efficient with cutting and trimming. The far end of this table had reached critical mass. Here's another view of the same heaping mess.

The piles contain all manner of quilting detritus. Most of the disarray consists of the remnants of old projects. My tendency to be so gung-ho on starting the next new thing means that I don't properly deal with the scraps and leftovers of the last one. After a few months of this slovenly behavior, a cutting table becomes a chaotic scrap mountain.

Here are additional views of the lovely mess. There on top is the embroidery project I intended to work on while in Florida. I didn't make very much progress on that at all.

Add to all those leftovers, the random trial block, fun "experiment," blocks, recent purchases, rejected auditions, numerous WIPs, and random whatnot - the piles just continue to grow, becoming ever more daunting to me when I think about tackling the clean up task.

With Sharon in the next room quilting, I set aside this time to face the music. The table must be cleared.

My first move was to bring up two empty storage tubs from the basement. I'd like to think that these will just be temporary holding places, but the jury is still out on that determination. It's hasn't been a full week since the cleaning; we will have to wait and see how temporary this is.

The day's efforts were very satisfying. I did make good progress, and feel like I have gained control of this particular situation, at least. (I have plenty of other situations needing attention, but I'm currently ignoring those.)

The two tubs are full. My next step here ought to be to move these fabrics into the color-sorted tubs which already exist in my closet. That requires a bit of space and lifting, so I can see it happening, but perhaps not immediately. 

The cross-stitch project is there on top, and hidden under it is another one I uncovered. I have so many UFOs and WIPs. My focus is all over the place.

And feast your eyes on all this cleared space! Whoa! Down there at the far end is the very next scrap-busting work I plan to do. 

A closer view will show you small stacks of strips and squares. I also have some leftover pieced blocks - orphan blocks - and a small bin of scraps that need to be cut down and added to the stacks I've got started. The fabric-covered tin can is my waste basket, and seeing it full is a good sign that I'm throwing things out. 

I have worked on whittling down that tub of scraps this week, and slowly but surely I am making my way to the bottom of the tub.

This final picture shows a bit of progress. I like to cut 5" squares (charm squares), 2.5" squares and strips, 2" squares and strips, and 1.5" squares and strips. There are some odd additional squares, and I have storage for all of these tucked into a corner and under my table. All will be put in the proper box or bin eventually. The tub still looks pretty full, but honest, I have cut a lot. 

So, the once annual cleaning of the table has taken place. I would like to think I will work harder at keeping it tidy, but I am not making any promises.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Clutter-Bug Remedies

 Never in my life of 60+years have I ever been referred to as a neat freak. More often than not, I live in perpetual clutter with a healthy dose of dust, just for effect.

If you have been with me here these past 4-5 weeks, you know that I am attempting to bring some order to my sewing room. Click this link to read some specifics.

Now let's address the conditions typically found on my sewing desk. Cluttered? Messy? Precariously piled? All of the above? Yes. (I once had a student refer to my desk as a 'black hole.') This truly has been a life-long tendency.

The photo above is from at least a couple of years ago, and perhaps I have tidied the desk once since then, but as late as last weekend, the situation looked much the same.

I am happy to report that the desk - at present - is sparkly clean! Have a look!

I love this! Why I have such a hard time keeping it like this mystifies me, but man-oh-man, this feels soooo good.

Messy Jayne went a step further in the cleaning process. There are 5 pincushions there on the clean desk. That is at least 3 too many. And they are all quite dusty and linty. I actually cleaned pincushions, if you can believe that.

My friend Sheryll made these pincushions (and a needle book). I use them a lot, and they'd become so dusty. I pulled out all the pins, needles, etc. and actually used an attachment on my sweeper to clean off the dust. What a difference!

I have set aside these two pincushions and will use them another time. I don't need so many out at once.

Now, I not only have a clean, useable surface at my desk, I have less clutter by putting things away, and I can keep nice things longer by taking better care.

Can old dogs learn new tricks??

Happy Quilting, Friends!