New and Improved Sewing Room

I'm never quite sure what to call my sewing room. I tend to alternate between sewing room and craft room. While I do more sewing in here than any other craft, I do store all my other crafts in here. Sometimes it just gets called my room. I'd love to call it my studio, but it just doesn't work in my head for this room, as studio calls up images of windows and light. I have one window, not large, that doesn't get much natural light. So I've always got the light on when I'm in here.

I know I've called this post 'new and improved', but it's not really new. I'm in the same room. But improved, has it ever!
I don't know if you know this about me, but I'm not naturally an organised person. This makes it challenging for me to get my space organised, as I'm never quite sure how best to do it, and do it in a way that makes it simple for me to maintain.

One of my friends however, is a born organiser, and she loves it. She came up last Friday and while our daughters kept each other amused, we spent 4 hours sorting my room out. So 8 hours work, and it was transformed. There is no way I could have done this on my own in 8 hours, not even if I didn't have my little one with me while doing it.
We rearranged furniture so that the room appears more open. Put things into big plastic tubs that I'd bought. The table has been cleared. The floor has been cleared, and vacuumed. A space has been cleared to put objects that make me happy.

I need to go through the drawers, cupboards, shelves and boxes in here, to remove items I no longer see myself using, and put them all in proper homes, fold fabrics, that kind of thing. But the room is completely usable. Plus because it is so tidy, pulling the contents out of one drawer or off one shelf to sort them isn't the massive task that it would have been a week ago. It also makes it easier for me to put things away, as I know where I want them to go, and it's the work of a minute to pick things up and put them away.

So my room is totally usable, inspiringly so (according to spellcheck, that isn't actually a word, but it's the only one I can think of to describe how my room currently makes me feel towards my crafting). I've managed to keep it completely tidy since Friday. I've finished one UFO, made progress on another, cut out and partially sewn a skirt from stash fabric (using all of it too) and found about 70 things that don't need to be in here.

We didn't take a before picture, and I'm kicking myself for that. But picture a table piled with stuff, on, under and around it. There was a walkway to my computer and sewing desks, but really, that's about all the usable/visible floor space there was.

This is what it looks like now:

View looking in the door

Yarn storage and drawers that need organising

Giant stack of plastic tubs

Usable worktable, currently there is even less on it

Sewing table, with two boxes of yarn beside it

Cupboard with fabric and random craft bits, smaller cupboard is (full) of UFO's

Computer desk/workspace

Shelves of fabric and books and bobs

I've got quite a large space, and there is a lot in here. I would like to make it a bit more open. But I now have some wall space to put up posters I've had nowhere to put for 4 years. It just feels so much more peaceful in here. 

I should stop raving about it, I just can't believe how good it feels. 

Short of Creative Time

I realised a few days ago that I hadn't written blogged in ages. Not since half way through my 31 Days of Unfinished Projects. Which I did do a little more on, but there were no more completed projects in October.

I have done some craft work in the past three months, I've even managed to finish a couple of things. And by couple, I mean about 4 small things, 3 of which were crochet washcloths. The main reason for this is I haven't had the time. I started working 4 months ago, instant loss of a whole bunch of time, then when you factor in there are lots of people on leave this time of year, I'm working even more. My husband also moved to another city for work, so during the week, I get to solo parent. A typical day currently is get up, drop little one at daycare, work, pop home for lunch, occasionally have time to put on washing or do some other housework task, back to work, pick up little one from daycare, go home, make dinner, spend time with little one till she's asleep (about 10pm) while trying to get some things around the house down, do the things that are needed to be ready for work/daycare in the morning then it's sleep time for me. Eeep, makes me exhausted just reading that. But it doesn't leave very much time for me.

I'm also working on a new project for me, right now, habits and decluttering. Which uses up what time I could find to create in.

I'm hoping in the new year, work will be a bit lighter, so I'll have some more time. In the mean time, 'real life' gets in the way of my being able to create.

I did finish a UFO this morning. I had decided yesterday, after talking to a friend who has a friend expecting a baby, to crochet her up a little baby hat. They're simple projects, don't take much time or wool and are so simple that I can do them in my spare minutes when I wouldn't be able to do a project that requires me to look at a pattern. Plus I think every baby needs handknits, especially if it's something made just for them. I decided which colour I was going to make it in as well. This morning, while slightly rearranging a cupboard to more easily get to the things that I use most frequently, I came across a nearly finished baby hat, in the right colour. It was tucked in the back behind a box. Why it was in there, I have no idea. 8 minutes later (yes, I timed it), I had a planned project completed and a UFO I didn't even know I had completed. Plus it used up an entire piece of ribbon from my trims drawer. So it was kinda stashbusting too. Yay :)

Pink Baby Hat

Now to go continue with resetting the house for the week ahead.