A Clean Studio

 A while back, October, maybe? I did a major clean on my studio. The studio is still pretty clean because we had a trip to Tennessee to see family and then all the holidays and I haven't had time to pack-rat stash stuff everywhere! I thought you might like to see it? The last time I posted about my studio was 5 years ago here. We've grown a bit since then!

These are my two sewing stations, one modern (Fern), one vintage (Jake). They sit (plop) in the middle of the room, which is about 10 by 10 feet. The picture was taken from the entry door.

Yup, that door right there! Behind the door is a pegboard to hold all my quilting rulers.

To the left, there is my stitching/computer area. I learned to stitch at a table and never got the hang of doing it on a couch or chair. To the right is a CD storage cabinet that I use to hold my embroidery floss. I've posted about it before here. I can just spin my chair around to be able to sew on Jake the Singer 404.

This is my ironing/fabric cutting station. Dash made this for me with an IKEA storage unit on casters and added a plywood top. It works like a dream, I iron on one end and cut fabric on the other. The storage on this is awesome. How much could you store under a traditional ironing board?

Another view from the doorway focusing on the bookcases I have for storage. Everything is there from fabric for cross stitching and sewing to my vintage sewing machines to pattern/design books. I even have a TV to watch AndyTube whilst I sew. Okay, I admit to being a vintage sewing machine nerd!

Oh, how I love my space! I don't care if you only have a basket beside an old ratty chair...it's your space! I know you love the needle arts as much as I and I'd love to see where you stitch!

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox

Mystery Quilt Week One

When I broke my arm, I was in the big middle of cleaning and organizing my studio in preparation for the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt On Ringo Lake. It's taken me every bit of effort to get the studio finished (mostly) and my fabrics purchased. Being one armed isn't for sissies!

I took a photo from every corner of my studio. The main thing I did was move one bookcase to stand beside it's brother and put the sewing cabinets back-to-back so Fern and Jake could be out at the same time. I only wish I had company...we could sew together!

Ironing is slow going! I'm glad to have the Oliso so I don't have to lift so much! The ironing motion is very close to one of the exercises I need to do so I'm doing that and looking very silly! I do most of my cutting on the end of the ironing station. Power Cutting, you don't need much room!

Not much ever changes at the stitchy desk where the computer lives.

I must close the door to get a ruler or my mini ironing board. Or the dog gate if Molly is being obnoxious! She loves to herd the spray starch!

Here are most of my Mystery Quilt fabrics. Mostly fat quarters and a bit of yardage. A lot of the neutrals are still on the shelf when this photo was taken.

I still have to iron most of the chocolate and all the aqua before I can move on to more cutting and then sewing. 

I do have all the neutrals ironed and the strips cut for the first clue. I have a broken arm and it takes forever to do stuff! But I am doing it! I don't even know if I can sew yet...I guess I will find out!

Linking up (late) to the first Mystery Monday Link Up Party!

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox

Pinch Me!

I mentioned to Dash how I wished I had more room for my quilting. 

The next thing I knew we were moving the home office into a small desk in the guest bedroom and the entire room was all mine. 

The room is only 10 foot by 10 foot with an extra cubby area that used to be the closet.

First up was the light. I asked Dash to get a florescent one with four bulbs. Dash said he picked out this one because it looked like quilt blocks. I love that man. No, you can't...he is mine.

On the door-way wall I built a design wall. It is six by six foot. I followed this tutorial to build the wall, click here. For my friends that don't quilt, a design wall is a place to hang blocks to see how they look, it's made with flannel so the cotton blocks kind of "stick" to it or can be pinned in place.

In front of the design wall is my pressing station. It is indescribable how awesome this thing is. The top is 62 by 24 inches. See all that storage? It rolls very easily, even on the carpet. I can't take any credit for the genius of this idea...click here to see how it's made.

I learned how to make elastic casing sewing the ironing board cover. I nearly made it too tight to put on! This is the tutorial I followed, click here.

This view shows how much of my design wall is still usable when the ironing station is in front of it. My cutting mat, rulers and a four foot folding table are leaning against the wall at the end of the unit. I haven't decided if I want to put up a pegboard to hang stuff on or what so there it sits until then.

To the left is the doorway.

I learned to sew lined curtains to match the pressing station. Curtains are surprisingly easy to create! I used this tutorial, click here. The fabric is a Kansas Troubles print called Clara's Garden.

I added a second bookcase for more storage. I'm sure things will change over and over until I work out the most convenient place for everything. 

You've seen my computer cubby before. The sewing desk is right behind so I just turn the chair around for each task. Lots of storage above the desk too. 

Every time I look in my craft room I think I'm dreaming. I think I'm way too excited about having it! It seemed to take forever to get everything together, made and put in place and now that it's done I don't know what to do. What to create next? I bet it doesn't take too long to come up with something! 

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox

ORTs. Two For One

It's a Bargain Sale this New Moon! I am so sorry for disappearing without warning. I have been completely unable to reach the desk where I stitch and blog. The entire room has been torn asunder the past several weeks as it undergoes a bit of renovation. Here are a couple of photos on a rather straightened up day.

Most days it was much, much worse.

I am seeing the light at the end. Which is good. It's been weeks since I have done any crafting. I am becoming rather cranky about it.

I promise to be back with some awesome photos when Dash and I finish the re-do. I think you will like what we've been busy with!

My ORTs for June are the ones I collected for the May Totally Useless Stitch A Long. Remember I was sewing a purse? That was the last thing I crafted before all hell broke loose and my room became unlivable. It turned out totally sweet!

 =^..^=

Now it is YOUR turn...we want to see your ORTs! Leave a comment on this post with a link to your May and/or June TUSAL post(s) so we can come visit! If I hold a Totally Useless giveaway your comment will earn you an extra entry.

Wondering what a TUSAL is and why all these people are posting pictures of rubbish? Click here to learn more and join the fun!

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox 

Please meet Fern

When I conceived the idea of learning to quilt my thoughts were along the lines of, "I have a sewing machine, what else would I need?" I mean people have quilted since before sewing machines were even invented, right? I have carpel tunnel so extensive hand sewing is not an option but I have a sewing machine ~ I'm set!

Not.

As I got farther into each step on my quilt, I knew I had better buy a walking foot for my machine before I got to that point. So I sit down and start searching. Oh NO! My machine is not made to use a walking foot!

Now, I had options...hand-quilting - out, as explained above...Have it quilted by someone else - I kinda had my heart set on actually learning to quilt, not just piece...Buy another sewing machine - sooo expensive! Drats...what to do?

I had already dealt with quite a few "problems" with my inexpensive, basic machine, an off the shelf Singer. It's always "needle up" and no way to change it. It has tension problems with the bobbin thread and no way to fix it. It's sewing speed is strictly based on how hard you push the foot control and I could really use a slower "top" speed until I get better.

Dash talked me into buying a new sewing machine when he learned of the problems I was facing. In fact...he searched the internet for the best possible price on the machine I was interested in and then insisted we buy it. She was delivered last week.

I'd like you to meet Fern. 

Fern, as I've named her is a Juki HZL-F600.

I think we are going to become very good friends!

I also got this nifty sewing desk for Fern to live on.

This all sits directly behind my stitching desk. All I have to do is turn my chair around to sew! I will need to buy a table to go behind the sewing desk when I'm actually quilting to support the quilt.

I've been practicing on some small pieces, while getting my big quilt ready for quilting. I'm looking forward to the finish!

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox 

Mayhem

I made a mess on Sunday! I had two small ornaments to finish. This involved pulling out the bins of fabric, trim, stuffing and interfacing.

I took over the kitchen table with sewing stuff. 

I took over the counter top with the ironing stuff. I like to iron craft things on my washable white craft towels instead of the ironing board.

It was glorious mayhem! I was having so much fun I opened a bottle of sweet red wine, poured it in a pitcher, added a can of tropical fruit and some ginger ale. This is tasty over ice in a fancy wineglass.

In fact, it was so tasty I drank the whole pitcher all by myself! Whoops! No, the ornaments came out just fine. All that alcohol only helped me loosen up my creativity! The ornaments are being mailed to their new owners so I will show them to you very soon.

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox

Clutter and Mess

You see, I am a pack rat. That is all there is to it. I once saw a sign that says, "I'm creative...don't expect me to be neat too!" That's me to a T. Fortunately, I am also obsessive/compulsive. So, while I may gather clutter, eventually my OCD will kick in and I will have a "neatness fest" and get rid of the piles of junk! Um...I'm still waiting for it to kick in this time 'round...

Apparently, I won Wanda's blog drawing last month or June, was it? This pretty pin arrived sometime during that week my mom was in the hospital. It got lost in my junk. I'm so sorry for not acknowledging this Wanda! That was one crazy time for me. Isn't this an unusual creation? And so pretty! Thank you Wanda!

There are piles behind me on the floor.

There are piles above those piles.

There are piles to the left of my laptop.

And there are piles to the right.

How can one be creative with all this clutter? It's amazing how fast this stuff grows...

.

My Autumn RAK has arrived in Canada at last! The little blackbird pin pillow went to dear Lynn of Kearnel's Korner. I'm so happy she liked what I made. It was great fun stitching for her! Now, we just wait for the next one to arrive!

.

Thank you for visiting my blog today!

xox

Why did I save an eyebrow?

The rest of the office/craft room got sorted today! We had a rainy day due to Ike sneaking by so it was perfect weather for finishing up this messy room. OMG, I am such a packrat! There was junk everywhere!

This is the desk. Hum, I need to tidy up those cords underneath. Why don't you notice those things in real life? Taco has another bed under this desk. When we were deciding which desk to buy a couple years ago, Jessie made the comment, "Any of these would be nice, until Mom clutters it all up!" She had a valid point. I do like to clutter. I try to keep it to a couple of smallish piles and everyone must admit, I have done an excellent job of keeping the desk-top clear.

The stitching area. I did buy a bulletin board for over my stitching desk. The chest of drawers holds the rest of my stitching supplies. I sorted all the drawers and straightened everything up. I even found my dark interfacing that had gone missing! This is the rest of the room. It's only 10x10, so we have had to maximise the space. The bins between the desk and bookcases are what I store my charts, leaflets, books and magazines in. There are also three of these bins under my desk. A lucky 13 in all and I'll need more soon. Packrat, ya' know. I need to go through the books on that bookcase, it's getting overloaded! I don't even want to think about what the basement looks like...

What the hell is that???

Oh, that's a Groucho Marx eyebrow. You know...from one of those party favor glasses with the moustache and eyebrows? It fell off. I found this while sorting ribbons and trim. It was in with the trim.

Why did I save an eyebrow?

Floss cabinet

Carol asked about the cabinet peeking out in my last post. That is my floss storage cabinet. It is actually a CD/DVD cabinet but it holds my floss bags perfectly! This was a birthday gift from Rick a couple of years ago. You can shop for your own here!

This is also little Miss Taco's favorite sleepy spot.

My floss is stored in zippered floss bags with a 3x5 index card inside to make the bag stand up. When I pull floss for a project, I hole-punch the card and add the bag onto floss rings. The white card makes it easy to spot which bag I'm needing. If I have tons of colors for one project, they go into an index card box. You can see them in yesterdays photos on the shelves...they look like green drawers.

Another day, another stash sort

It was so frustrating to know I have a certain teeny button but no idea where it is. It wasn't in this drawer, it wasn't in that box, it isn't here or there. Where is it? I've been looking for days. The first photo here is the reason why I can't find anything. So much clutter. How can one stitch with all this crap all over one's desk? Notice the clock in said photo. Noon! Time to start cleaning. Actually I'd already been cleaning for quite a while before I thought to take a picture...so this is really cleaner than it was!

Notice the clock now...4 pm! Whew! I got a lot accomplished today. I sorted all the drawers under my desk, all the boxes above on the storage shelves. I removed stuff that didn't belong here and I even found my missing button. There is now a box for trims, another for sewing, one for WIPs and one for buttons, beads, charms, pins & eyelets. I still need to sort the huge box of floss, bag them and put them away in the cabinet. I also haven't touched the chest of drawers that holds all of my fabrics and other stash. And we haven't even seen the other side of the room! I'm leaving that for another day.
I'm thinking a bulletin board over the desk to the left would be handy. This area is used a lot more now that I have the laptop. All the clutter wasn't quite as noticable (meaning, it didn't get in the way as much) until I added the laptop! I like the idea of having all my WIPs boxed...they won't get dusty when they aren't being worked on. They just don't need forgetting...