We made it through the holiday season. Projects were finished and now our sewing
space looks like a tornado went through it. Or maybe it isn’t so bad for you but you just want
things to be organized again or even just a better organization than before. Over the next
couple of weeks, I will be sharing some hints and tricks to get your sewing space back to a
usable and easy-to-find items space.
Getting started is one of the hardest parts of cleaning up because it is so easy to get
overwhelmed. This time around I decided to take “before” pictures. This allows me to look
back and see what I accomplished. Sometimes it takes knowing that even though I just did a
little today but I can already see I made some difference helps. When I took the photos it was
hard to not try and make it look cleaner than it really was (mostly because I knew that I was
going to be sharing the photos and hoping that I wouldn’t be judged too hard). The holiday
season is rough for me. I am working on a million things at one time and trying to get all the
deadlines finished. I literally had a path to my cutting table and that is it.
There is it in its full glory. My sewing space is a mess. It is not going to be fixed all in
one day and it is a process. No one should feel bad about the mess they have. We all have it to
some degree. Fear not! I will help give tips to make it organized.
Let’s get started! You are going to need a couple of boxes or bins. We are going to label
them yardage, scraps, fat quarters, notions, books/patterns, projects, donate and trash. I
originally had other labels but as I started I realized that these work better. The next thing to do
is to start in one spot. I started with my cutting table because I could then use the space as I
cleaned other areas to organize.
As stuff came off the cutting table I sorted it into the different bins. Now, I did not go
through the bins yet. I just wanted to have a clean space to sort and go through. If there was a
project I did try to keep all the pieces together along with the pattern. I did not separate that
pattern or book from it.
You can put most things in the other boxes and as you go through you might move
things to the donate and trash so don’t stress about it.
The goal for the week is to take before pictures and clear off one section by separating
things into piles.
Next week we are going to go through what we separated and start organizing and
putting away before we tackle the next area. If you want to share your before pictures we
would love to see them! Remember there are no judgements!
Happy Sewing
~Laura
