I have a shelving unit in my sewing room that is all cubby holes, like a foot square each. I have 4 projects that I am actively working on so I have the materials and completed blocks for each in it's own cubby. I keep the scraps there together until they are no longer possibly needed and then they go into other cubbies by color.
I always keep the door closed so that no odors, especially cooking odors, get into the fabrics.
What I was about to say, and got distracted by the storage of materials, is that I get distracted too. I went up last night to do some piecing, looked at my cubbie of books, and got out some old magazines, one from 1974, and started looking through them. There are some nice, old fashioned applique patterns in there. I also looked at a stained glass pattern book and thought how great some of them would be made into a quilt or wall hanging... I didn't get any sewing done.