Found: One Craft Room

After some clearing out



A few weeks ago, I decided that it was about time that I reclaimed back my craft room.  For the last few years, I have just used it to store all my craft stuff but then got fed up of having to buy new card and products as I could not find the original ones that I had bought.  Things seemed to come to a head when I couldn't find an embossing folder that I wanted that I knew that I owed and ended up buying a new one.  I had been putting everything in the craft room and things were just stacking up and I didn't know what was there anymore.  Also, I was finding that I was doing everything downstairs in the living room and there was not really a table high enough and that I was getting a sore back from bending over so much . It was especially so when making my Christmas cards this year and things were not easily at hand.



overflow of stash



The photo above was after I had cleared a lot out and put elsewhere (photo right) until the room had been cleared.  I had forgotten to take a photo before I started although I am not sure that it would have shown just how much was in the craft room - no photo is that big!  It got to the stage where under the stairs was completely full, the craft room was so full that I was not able to walk in there and my stash was starting to overflow elsewhere.

I was going to wait until I had a few days holiday this month but then decided that it could not wait and there was possibly more than I would be able to do in the few days that I was going to have. It was time to be ruthless and only keep what I really needed and could not do without. I had tried a few different crafts such as silk painting and Precious Metal Clay but had not done them for a while so it was out with them.

Craft Room after being cleared

I even realised that I had four sewing machines and that I was never going to use them so two of them ended up at the tip.  I ended up taking 3 full car loads of rubbish down to the tip - and that is without all the magazines.  I did keep all my stash of material for patchwork and quilting but did get rid of any small scraps.  It was amazing to see what material I actually had and don't think I need to be buying any more for quite some time.

I had magazines on Parchment Craft, Quilting and Card Making going back to 1994 and these are also going to end up in the recycling bin but first I am scanning in all the articles and patterns that I want and keeping them electronically which will take up a lot less room.  A small 2 inch flash drive is taking up a lot less room that 6 stacks of magazines each 3ft high and that is only what if left.  It is going to take some time to go through all of the magazines extracting what I want  so I still have a stack of magazines but am getting through them.

Now organised

Some of the books that I no longer wanted I gave to my local library as they were in immaculate condition and other people will then be able to get pleasure out of them.  I was surprised that they took them but they seemed really grateful and meant that I got rid of the straight away.  Even if they don't put them on the shelves but sell them, it will given them funds to buy other books.

I was hoping to finish it a lot sooner than I did but suddenly ended up with orders from 4 people to make some Christmas cards for them and as 1 person was sending her cards overseas it meant that things had to be  put on hold for a little while although the main thing was that I had cleared the desk and so was able to utilise that for my embossing and glittering. 

I still have a little more to do but everything from the craft room and under the stairs has been put it its place and I know where everything is and can even get to it.  I will now be able to do more crafting and as can be seen from the photos above - a lot better than before. 

Now to keep it like it!!