Going Down the Organizing Rabbit Hole

Going Down the Organizing Rabbit Hole

There are diversions and then there are DIVERSIONS!  Organizing can be one of those.  I finished the BIG piece I’ve been working on and instead of leaping into something new, I got sidetracked with organizing.  Organizing my work space, it’s pretty small so it takes some doing to spend more than a few hours on this one, organizing my threads, I’ve got a LOT of thread, so this one is easy to lose oneself for a day or two or week or month, and organizing my materials, again there’s a lot of stuff, some of which I use often, others not so much, still it’s a sink hole.

It all began with a YouTube video, doesn’t it always, though?

See that huge bag filled with thread winders?  That’s only some of them.  I did another video for my Patrons over on Patreon and had a little give-away.  Five lucky patrons are receiving a nice package of those thread winders from me. I haven’t sent them yet, because I keep finding cleverly hidden stashes of OH, so that’s where those were! threads that I then rewind onto those large cardboard bobbins and put in those 16″ long plastic refrigerator shelves.  It makes my life so much easier when I can see everything easily and quickly.

But now I’m nearing the end of my reorganization efforts, not that one is ever really done organizing, it’s like laundry, AND I have a lengthy to-do list that is calling to me as well, but the nagging thought that I need to start a new piece has been buzzing around making life feel a bit more fraught than usual.  A friend of mine used to say that she was both the team of horses pulling the carriage AND was also the driver with the whip beating those horses on.  It’s all a bit like that.  Still there’s good that comes from it.  Organizing makes me breathe easier, having a to-do list calms that voice that screams at me, and knowing I will not feel calmer until I begin a new project, propels me on.

It’s all good, as they say.

The stoics suggest that each day is best lived as though it were your last.  But if I did that, I wouldn’t get all that much done, because I’d just spend every moment that they’d allow with my children and husband and cat.  So yeah, there’s that.

Now I have some fabric kits for one of my upcoming workshops to pull together…  did I mention those?

No?

Oh well…

 

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A Work Space of One’s Own

A Work Space of One’s Own

At three in the morning, in a fit of frenzied sleeplessness I decided my work space was in desperate need of reorganization.  And what great idea that comes to you in the wee hours of the morning isn’t a brilliant one?!  However, upon further reflection, I decided reorganizing is not one of my strengths and so, I did what anyone would do. I solicited the help of someone who excels at reorganizing.  Step into the limelight my fabulous husband (FH) and take a bow.  He is extremely good at just this sort of thing.  “Okay,” he said, all business-like, “talk me through this.”  And then proceeded to ask me a series of questions.

From this conversation he prioritized and broke down what I needed to do in manageable steps.  I forgot to take a photograph of the disaster that was once my work space, but this is what it looked like at about the halfway point.

As I was trying to decide what color I should paint that great expanse of white wall (this was a tricky decision as it is a dark room, made even darker by the red carpet I bought decades ago in Turkey) I thought, “I need a design wall!”  This is not essential, after all I have sketch books and a table where I can play with ideas, but a design wall would be really, really nice to have.  So I googled design walls and found some wonderful ones.  I decided I wanted one that is at least 62″ x 72.”  In order to do this I needed to get rid of a great many things scattered all over the place.

I decided on a bright mango color to brighten the room up.  However, as with so many things in life, painting one wall proved more complicated than I anticipated.  I ran into bubbles.  Thousands and thousands of tiny bubbles appeared after the first coat of paint.  I pricked one of them with a pin and, much to my horror, the bubble expanded exponentially, revealing all the coats of paint below the fresh coat I’d just painted, so that I was staring at dry board!  I was so horrified I didn’t have the presence of mind to take photos, but my FH was witness.  I ended up pulling off great sheets of bubbled up paint.  After running to the hardware store for advice, making a couple of emergency phone calls to friends of mine who are far more experienced in painting walls than I am, I finally pulled up as much paint as I could, sanded, dusted, spackled, sanded some more, dusted some more and finally repainted and held my breath.  What should have taken a few hours took more than a day and a half, BUT it came out pretty well, if I do say so myself!  FH had the great idea of hanging my ironing board.walllookingoutThen there was the question of my design wall, which is removable.the-designwallI needed to organize my fabrics and other materials that I use for my jewelry design, such as wax, files, metals, wire, etc. While I was doing all of this, I came across my old portfolio from my days in fashion design and got a little side tracked… croqueparsonsfinalparsonsFinally, after all of that, I got back on track.

And here is the finished space!jewelryfabricwallthewallNow it’s time to get back to work – I have a queen-sized quilt to sandwich, baste and free motion quilt and then there are these little guys who keep calling to me.

sharkey

A work in progress – Sharkey Dog

rhino

The African Rhino and his Friend – Blue Bird