A room of my own . . .

I've been very, very busy.  I found a project that I really, really wanted to do and I did it.  I used to have tatting and knitting and spinning stuff all over the house.  I had it in my bedroom (tons of it) in the corner behind the bed.  Most of my stash and books used to fit there, but as it grew, it outgrew that space.  I had a bunch behind and under the chair I sit in to watch tv - as that stash grew it became unruly and I almost got moved out of the chair.  I had it in the bay where the window is in my bedroom but that area, too, was fuller than full.  I also had (still have) a bunch in the 'bedroom' at the end of the hall.  All the portable weaving looms are in that room and the spare spinning wheel and a bunch of odds and ends.

In general, my stash of yarn, equipment and books was a mess.  It had gotten to be too big for any one place and probably too big for all the places it was in.  It was such a mess that I couldn't ever find anything.  I had (have) multiple copies of books and patterns because I couldn't find the first copy so I bought/got a new one. I had to buy more yarn when I wanted to make things because I couldn't ever find the yarn I was looking for at the time I needed it.  

 On top of that, my office was a mess.  See that pile of papers on the left, in front of the office supply shelves?  That's about 7 years of my bills and several years of Mom's bills.  The desk is a mess in that picture, and it's still not neat, but I can find the printers now.

This is a close up of the pile of papers.  You can see the filing boxes that I was trying to file things in - they just weren't any where near big enough, so it overflowed.

 This is the couch that I'm supposed to be able to sit and relax on in my room.  Actually, this picture was taken after I had already started to clean up.  You couldn't see that table when I started and the only creature that could find a place to sit on that couch was the smallest cat.

 

This is some of the cleaned up stuff - that box is trash, the black crates are the new filing boxes for Mom's and my bills.  Everything else on that wall is gone and the table in the alcove has been moved and cleaned off so I can use it to ball yarn or sort threads or lay out things or whatever I want to use it for.

First, I filed all the bills in proper files hanging in pendaflex in those two crates.  My bills went back to 2004 and I didn't figure I needed that many years of paper, so I threw away many years worth of bills.  Mom's are all sorted and filed so anyone can see what I've done when I get audited by what's left of the TTB.  I moved the couch over closer to the office supply shelves so I would have room at the other end for a light and some other things.  The box on the table is Girl Far From Home's shoes - they need to be mailed back to the folks who are remaking her custom shoes in the right size.

This is the corner - that little plastic chest of drawers holds all kinds of tools and bits.  It has needles and stitch markers and doll/animal eyes and beads and hairpin lace looms and many other wonderful things that used to be in my closet or under my bedside table and in other very hard to get to places.  They won't be nearly as hard to find now.

That is the table that was in the alcove.  The girls used to keep their computers on it but they've long since take the computers up to their rooms (or off to college).  The basket on it is filled with things that have been knitted and have no home - lots of wash cloths, hair bands, hats, wrist warmers, swatches and samples.  I wonder if anyone would want some of those if we included them in a giveaway?  The boxes have mostly spinning fiber in them but a couple have yarn in them.  There are two sweater kits that I bought about 30 years ago - a Kaffe Fasset for him and another one for me.  The basket on the floor has spinning wheel parts (bobbins, flyers, plying head), several spindles, my cards and combs, etc.

The shelf with the baskets in it way back in the corner has all my tatting stuff in it.  It's so lovely to be able to walk over there grab a basket with the size thread I want and find the color that strikes my fancy today.  All the shuttles are in another basket, so they are easy to find too!

And, of course, you can see the cubbies for my yarn!  I can't tell you how wonderful it is to be able to find my yarn!  (Though there is still some missing - not sure where it got off too.)  I wanted some black felting wool and was able to walk right over to the two cubbies of feltable wool, grab what I wanted and walk away in just seconds.  No more digging through bags and boxes and moving stuff and still not finding what I wanted.  The clip on light makes it easy to see the yarn and get the right color.

And next to the yarn is the bookshelf with all my knitting, tatting, weaving, dying, spinning and other fiberly books on it.  I have a few.  I love having them all in one place and in alphabetical order by author.  Well, I did sort the books by subject first so all the tatting books are together and all the knitting books are together.  

And these two shelves hold all my magazines.  The top, black shelf has all the Workbasket magazines on it.  It also has my cd collection because there isn't room for me to put it with Steve's collection because he has way too many.  The bottom shelf has all the Family Circle Easy Knitting, Vogue Knitting, Knit Simple, Knitters, Interweave Knits, Piecework, Spin Off, etc.  They are all in date order.  The two plastic file boxes have all the paper patterns I have - both knitting and tatting.  They still need to be sorted out and put in some semblance of order - still can't find what I need in those!

This is that wall and the alcove all in one shot.  It's like a library in here now!  It was really hard work, and it's not finished yet, but it is SOOOOO worth it!  I really love my new room!

And, of course, my mascot still lives on top of my monitor.  He watches to make sure I knit a little tie dye every so often - and I do.