WMUTeach

You go for it, Julienm!! Be a winner and make lots of quilts and other fabric projects this year.

quiltingcotton

I'm pretty organized in my quilting room as far as everything has its place and is easy to keep cleaned up after a day of quilting, but... and there is always a but!

I've been having issues with my thread breaking. Fooled around with the machine etc. etc. and after the 20th some break of my thread within 2 hours one day, discovered that it was actually the thread and nothing to do with my machine.

I have always used all cotton thread, and apparently it has gotten old on me, even keeping it in plastic boxes. Long story short, just a quick snap between my hands and the thread will break. Okay, not a problem, I thought, its just this one cone... nope. I have a lot of thread that I purchased during a major sale years ago and pretty much all of it has weakened. I'm kicking myself as I toss the thread and clean out my bobbins.

The good news is that I have started to replace some of it with poly thread, and my machine actually likes it much better, it is so lint free and smooth going through with no lint getting caught up in the tension. I'm also back to keeping only a couple of cones of basic colors for a more antique look, instead of matching thread color to fabric color..

On the flip side, this also got me looking at my fabric stash and thinking I really need to say goodbye to some of the old fabric that I have been shuffling around for years taking up space, because it isn't my style or taste anymore. Thankfully there isn't very much in that capacity, it just needs for me to get the umps to pull it out and let it go. Thankfully I have a place where I can donate the fabric.

WMUTeach

Good inspiration and reminder, quiltingcotton. On the other hand, during COVID I used spool after spool of old thread but it did not "mess" with my machine and did not break. Lots of donation quilts left my space with old thread.holding them together. Using the "tug" test is a good idea for us all.

Julienm1

Rereading my previous post and I did make a couple kits but ended up finishing several UFOs and donated them to Project Linus. That took care of Jan and Feb. Past couple days have been grabbing a basket of fab and trimed fabric into usable sizes. Usually, 5" squares and 2" strips. Just a couple cuts from each hunk. And YES, I do have patterns in mind for the cuts.

Julienm1

Past couple months have donated LOTS of quilts to Project Linus. However, I've learned I love to make quilts but hate the "aftermath of chaos'" it creates with my fabric. Seems sewing with scraps and various size of leftovers has turned my mountain of scraps into a mountain range. After I finish these 2 quails I'm working on, I'll have to take a couple days to tidy up this mell of la hess.

tranum

The shop owner who sells everything ( except fabric ) told us at guild, if your thread breaks, it’s most likely dry. Store it in the refrigerator and it will absorb moisture so it’s useable.

Snooze2978

I hadn't thought about reorganizing this year but I'll be having a type of flooring put into my machine room only similar to the epoxy stuff you see on garage floors so decided it was time to detash since I'd have to remove everything out of the room or at least most everything as there's no place to store my quilt system so we have to move it to one side and then the other side the following week once the 1st half of the floor is done. So I've been going thru drawers in the rolling carts under the frame, up on the peg board, etc and clearing out what I haven't used in a number of years. If I'm not using it, why keep it, right? Anyway, so far I've given around 2 6 drawer rolling carts, quite a bit of sewing essentials I just don't use or need. I've gone thru all my rulers in the drawers to see if I think I'll ever use them and if not, the thrift shop will or has already received them. I've given them a ton of large scraps in a 13 gallon trash bag plus I had this plastic container stuffed with smaller scraps that filled 2 - 2 gallon zip lock bags, they also went to the thrift shop. Next I'll go thru all my dress fabrics and see if they still sing to me and if not, bag them up and take to the thrift shop. Then I'll hit the cotton fabrics and see what doesn't sing to me.

Everything will have to be moved into the other half of the basement so I won't be able to do any sewing for at least 2 weeks and then another week to put everything back into the other room but more organized and less cluttered, hopefully.

I also have to do the same for the garage also so will start pulling stuff that has been stashed up in the rafters and see if I still need them or not. If not, thrift shop will be getting a bunch of stuff from me. I was able to clear out some extra canning jars and sold them on marketplace so not everything was given away.

Julienm1

Today's the day. Quilt number 10 has 1 edge left of binding sewing and then start on the mountain range of fabric stuff. While I'm moving stuff around, I plan on cutting 6.5 and 5.0 squares for next project. Plan sounds good in my brain but...? Wish me luck.

LGJARN52

Because I sew out on the 3 season porch in the warm months and then back in my old small sewing room during the winter I'm always moving items back and forth. I have several machines, but mainly use my Janome 6500MC and my BabyLoc "Jazz" it occured to me to just keep one in each room. This makes it so much easier to be able to watch prerecorded tv while I'm sewing in the old smaller room, and when I need more space for cutting and quilting to use the 3 season room and listen to the radio. Also I think it's past time to sell or donate some of the cutting templates in various sizes....many are duplicates in sizes but different manufactures. It could be time to go through my yardage and figure out what I'll use and what has been hanging around too long. Maybe I'll be more organized in 2026?