Reorganaizing the Sewing Room/Office/Guest Room, 2nd Do-over
 

Once was not enough. I have guests coming for Chrismas (Merry Christmas everyone!) and I am still struggling with finding a place to put everything, even though I just reorganized last summer. I now realize that this is an ongoing process and not just a once-in-a-blue-moon kinda thing. I'm psyching up for a 2nd organization plan and execution right after the holidays. I am determined to win this war!

So many projects...so little space.

~ C

My sewing room is also a guest room when needed - I had a murphy bed installed so I didn't need to keep a bed in my way of using the room. But when company comes my sewing goes on the back burner - so one thing I do is get a large box and put my current project in the box and when they leave it comes out and I put everything back where it belongs.

Pay for the hotel room. You don’t need that kind of inconvenience.

sandy

My husband's favorite thing to say is that he hates clutter and hates cleaning up clutter. He says this about his home office and his hobby room which has a large model railroad. I have problems with my sewing room sometimes. In the rest of the house I pick up and put away things that are out of place every day-usually in the morning. My cupboards and closets are always neat. Why can't I do that in my sewing space? I don't know the answer. So, now that the Christmas projects are over, I will re-organize the clutter in this space and promise myself I will do better. Hopefully, I will do better in 2018. We can always hope!

I thought I had everything pretty much organized. I took over a two bedroom apartment. The large bedroom still has a bed, which I can use to lay a quilt on even though it is just a full sized bed, not queen like the quilts I make. But one wall is the stash complete with wire racks. There are boxes and tubs (see theough) of fabric. The bolts of fabric are kept in the bathroom. The other bedroom is the cutting room with large desk and two cabinets. The entry way, two of them are fairly large and hold my sewing machine collection. The living room has the sewing machines I'm working on and the long arm. The tiny kitchen is the sewing machine repair area.

My problem is the stash. I was making a list of the UFOs and found more fabric just like I had just purchased. I already had that fabric!!

So how do you organize the colors of the fabric? Are the comic book boards the answer?

Marcia

Fun to organize and get ready for 2018! I feel better with everything organized and can't function in chaos.

I use the 6 1/2 ruler fold method and then stack by color on the shelves. It's easy to slip out the fabric needed. Specific collections can be tied together and marked for a project. I also include a small tab on the folded fabric with yardage amount.

This method works for me. I previously used the plastic fabric boards and re-folded stash to this method. All new purchases are folded and put away the same day.

I plan a serious re-organization tomorrow while DH has some necessary repair work to be done in the shop.
My sewing area is our livingroom (it was unused space, just waiting for a purpose, lol). The front closet stores stash and patterns and WIP in shoe boxes. There is an old antique sideboard that's filled with fabric.
But, I have gotten very lazy and stacked stuff here, there, and everywhere there is a flat surface.
Consequently I can't find two particular fabrics I bought last fall.
So, no sewing tomorrow for me, I'm forcing myself to clean, sort, and tidy! (And maybe pet the fabric a little too!)

I folded all my fabrics with a ruler. I slip out of stack when I need them. I just get them all mixed up. I need to take time to try and put in order according to color.

Once I get it all organized, it really helps if I force myself to pick up after I finish a project. That worked for me for quite a while. Then I "fell off the wagon". Now I need to start again. My main problem now is that I don't have enough space to store all my SABLE and I really, really have a hard time purging. Yet, that's what really needs to be done!

Good luck to everyone here with similar struggles. Maybe we can WIN in 2018!

My sister is coming from Texas at the end of the week with her hubby and college-age boys. They will be staying at my dad's, not here (he's 15 minutes from me). But she shares a love for quilting and has never seen my quilting room/guest room. Since I want her to have some hobby time while here, I'll invite into my happy place.

But I'm not happy with how it looks right now. It needs a thorough tidying and deep cleaning. The dust on the power strips I use is probably a fire hazard.

Thankfully I like to organize and set up systems . (Maintaining those systems is my nemesis.) And since I always get a surge of energy as the New Year approaches, this is about as good a time as any to make order out of chaos (she says as she turns her head away from the wreckage and back to her churn dash blocks).