CraftyHope: craftroom

Many of you asked for updates on how the craft room is coming along. While I didn't make MUCH progress this week. I'm quite excited about the few small improvements I can already see. Let me say, that at this point in the scheme, I'm working mostly to get rid of or just remove items from the craft room and reorganize the ones staying. There's not a whole lot of re-design going on just yet. However, I have begun to consider a color scheme. I'll get to that in another post.

For now. . .

That bookcase was overwhelmed with stuff (here's last week's post for a reminder.) I've boxed up a bunch of the books (mostly ones on organization. . .HA!) to donate and moved some others to the bookcase in the living room. The Mickeys also got moved to the bedroom. [For now, they're just in a box until I can get Pat to pull out a bookcase from the garage and put it in the bedroom.] In addition, moving books into the living room meant that I ended up having to go through all of the books in there as well. As a result, the thrift store will be getting TWO boxes of books from me!! All the books and magazines that did stay on this bookcase are pretty much craft related.

To replace all of the stuff that was on there, I moved a bunch of my "sewing supplies" from under the window to this unit. On the bottom shelf is my large sewing machine and two sewing baskets. In addition, my embroidery floss and basket of zippers also found their way here. As you can tell, there's still room for a few more supplies. I just haven't made it that far yet.

The Craftroom closet was also completed.

It doesn't look like much of a change from what you saw last week, but for me. . .it's MAJOR!

To aid me, I've got my handy dandy notebook with me.

As I purge and organize, I'm using it to jot down notes to remind myself things like

USE the fabric scraps I have to make some fabric beads
Research some different ways to organize rubber stamps
Make or buy some curtains
Take down clothesline running across craft room and figure out another way to display my dried flowers
Decide on a paint color for the hutch
Buy a taller filing cabinet
Figure out a better way to store ribbon

Seriously! These are the notes I leave to myself. Otherwise, I might just forget.

With that in mind, I'm thinking about popping over to a few thrift stores this afternoon to look for some storage solutions. Wish me luck!

I know I haven't listed anything new in the shop in about a week, but I did place two pairs of earrings on sale this morning!

Turf Earrings - 20% OFF

Copper Calla Lily Earrings - 15% Off!

And now. . A big THANK YOU to all of you who visited yesterday for the Button Swap Blog Hop and left such encouraging comments. I really thought I was the only one who would like the Ent Wife necklace, but y'all really surprised me with all the support. Thank you.

Finally, I've come to the end. Let me wish you a Happy Earth Day AND a most Blessed Easter!

Wow!
Y'all really surprised me with all the comments yesterday about my craft room . . . .and I didn't even have any pictures.

Just some of the felt I organized this afternoon.

I should remedy that today. But first. . .let me explain that after I saw Patty's beautiful studio, I went straight to work on weeding out mine. So, these pictures are not 'true' BEFORE pictures. In addition, once you see these. . .you'll understand my desperate NEED to redecorate, reorganize, and simply overhaul the entire craftroom. Please don't judge me!

Looking straight into the craftroom from the door. (The big pile is trash and items to be donated to the thrift store.)

Inside to the left of the door is this little cardboard drawer unit. The items in the floor are 'keepers' that need a new home in the room.

Here's the craftroom closet. I had already started on it when this photo was taken. You should have seen it before. . .it was BAD!!

I know it's hard to see much in this pic, but it's obvious that there's stuff all over the place. This is the window that needs a storage seat built under it (right where all that mess is.)

In the far corner is my hutch that I'd like to paint a nice, bright, vibrant color. It holds all kinds of miscellaneous miscellanea.

Here's the craft desk and the chaos that exists behind it. I like to have my supplies within reach and that's going to be the biggest challenge with my redesign.

And we're back facing the door. Unfortunately, you can't really see much of this area. I'll try to get a better picture of it later.

So that's the craft room in a nutshell. I've made a few small decisions about it.
1. The wall color will remain the same. I'm not as much a fan of this color as I was when we moved in and painted it. I'd LOVE to change it. However, the subtlety of it will work with a wide range of other colors I'd like to introduce.
2. The Mickey collection on the big bookcase will need to be moved. I want to move it into the bedroom (the Mickeys not the bookcase) since the walls in there are red and will match. But, I think Pat just wants to get rid of it entirely. That's not going to happen.

I've already made one trip to the thrift store with donations. It was a good amount of stuff.

This and two more plastic grocery bags were dumped on Goodwill this afternoon!

You should see what I kept. I realize that I don't especially NEED all of the items that I'm hoarding to make tiny jewelry components. I've got STACKS of books and papers and other ephemera that I keep for collage purposes. Right now, I'm considering making packets of these pieces to sell online or give away. Granted, that will take some time also. Perhaps that will be a project later. But first, I was wondering what y'all thought of that idea. . .let me know.