April Stashbusting Report

I'm doing a little happy dance around the studio today!  I love it when I use more fabric than I buy and that is exactly what I did this month.  In fact, I used enough fabric to wipe out my excess fabric in from last month.  Yee Haw! Comparing this year to last year,  I'm ahead on fabric used through last April and behind in fabric coming in. And, that is exactly what I like!  Of course, I'm fabric shopping tomorrow.  

2015	Fabric In Month	Fabric in Year	Fabric Out Month	Fabric Out Year	Total In or Out Year
April	4.75	23.75	11.00	26.65	2.90

Earlier this year Sharon moved her studio into her basement.  I'm sharing Sharon's new studio.  She loves my former-attic studio.  We have a lot of fun sewing together when we get together.  Her original studio was a pretty small bedroom on her second floor.  Previously, when we sewed at her house either we'd set up on the dining room table or I'd plan to cut something out or we took turns at her sewing machine.  Well all that has changed with a move to the basement.  A lot of work went into freshening it up and making it work for her sewing. Dale did a great job fixing it up for Sharon (and me!) 

Viewing the basement stairs from the main floor.  Great quilt on the wall at the bottom.

This is one of two sewing stations.  You can see the second one at the back of the room on the left. 

Here's the second station looking to the left of the front section of the space.  It's an "L" shaped room. 

This is taken from the room in background of the picture above looking at her cutting table and sewing station number 2.  If I remember correctly, the double doors on the right house her stash. (If I am wrong, it's the doors going to the water heater and mechanicals.) 

Can you tell she is partial to blues? I'm pretty sure she has more fabric in another closet cause she's missing purples and bright whites.  Just saying! 

That's it for today.  I have a big quilt on Ruthie that is almost finished.  That's today's goal and I've been writing this instead of getting upstairs and finishing it.  I have until Sunday so I'm not worried as there are only 3 rows left, maybe 4.  

Happy Quilting All. 

15 Minute Spiff Up #6

Are you ready to move on? Are you tired of working on batting?  Or did you go off to your own area and make progress where you needed it the most? I was lucky with the batting -- mine was mostly organized so it didn't take me all that long.  I can't say the same for this week's chore.  Are you ready? 

Our next assignment is: 

Straighten Up and Organize Your Fabric -- Yardage! 

You already know I keep smaller pieces -- fat quarters and left over bits and pieces in baskets on top of my shelves.  You saw how great they looked several weeks ago. Now I'm attacking my yardage of 1/2 yard or more. I have to admit this wasn't my favorite assignment.  In fact, I haven't finished it yet.  But, I must admit my yardage is not in horrible shape, just messy.  

Many years ago I changed how I stored my yardage. I used the book Creating Your Perfect Quilting Space by Lois Hillock when we moved into our previous house.This was a book, not a workbook. Before, I stored my yardage in clear plastic bins on open shelving.  The fabrics were organized by color in the bins.  It worked but I had to drag out the bins, pull the lids off and rifle through them when I was looking for fabric.  Not the best situation but usable.  After reading the book I decided I would try Lois's method of folding the fabric over a ruler and then folding it in half.  That year for Mother's Day my son gave me some time to do whatever I wanted him to do.  You got it.  He was folding fabric for me -- yard after yard of it.  And, my fabric became much easier to find and use.  Since then I've kept my fabric, by color on open shelves. 

Generally my fabric isn't all that messy.  It does get plowed through and moved around and the straight piles become crooked and disorganized.  Here's what it looked like when I started the Spiff Up 6 weeks ago.  Not looking all that great.  Of course, the top of the shelf was cleaned up when the fat quarters were straightened up. 

As I said, I haven't finished this project.  But here are the shelves that have been restacked and spiffed up! What I am not going todo is work on the leftover plastic bins.  They hold odd bits and pieces of fabric by color.  When I have room in one of the basket of fat quarters and small pieces I will sometimes drag out one of the bits from the plastic bins.  I should also straighten the fabric on the top of the bins.  Most of that fabric is owned by the quilt guild and I store it down there so I don't forget who it belongs to.  

Now when I bring new fabric into the house I wash it and then fold it over an 8 1/2" x 24" ruler. If it is more than 1/2 yard I also try to mark how much fabric is folded so I don't have to unfold it to see how much is available. (Does this look familiar to last week's plan?) 

Ok Spiffer Uppers!  That's your assignment -- clean up, organize, and neaten up your fabric stash.  Whatever way you choose to store your fabric make sure you've got it organized, easily accessible and neat! I'll finish spiffing up my yardage and then figure out what area we need to move on to.  I have a sneaking suspicion that the next areas I move into will take more than a week of work to get it easily accessible and looking decent.  Let me know how you do.  

How do you store your yardage?  Yardage to me is generally over 1/2 yard but some of my pieces in my color stacks are smaller.  Just like some of my pieces in my fat quarter baskets are bigger.  Give us your best ideas.  You never know when your method will spark interest in someone else. 

I'm slowly working on getting some of my sewing goals for the week worked on. This cold is still dragging me down enough that I went to the doctor today.  Well, good, it truly is a cold and hopefully, with medication, I'll start feeling better soon. 

Happy Quilting All!