Happy Thanksgiving! (part 1)

I love Thanksgiving - of the winter holidays, this is my favorite.  My husband and I were married the day after Thanksgiving as well - it was the 29th that year, but I think I’ll always think of it as the day after Thanksgiving.  It’s five years this year!   Woo!

I believe in the Thanksgiving idea of inter-cultural sharing.  The Austin InterFaith group has an annual Thanksgiving celebration that I love.  The executive director (CEO, rather) of the nonprofit I work for is a big part of Austin InterFaith.  She’s awesome.  I’ve never met anyone who devoted themselves to ideals and the welfare of others like her.  She has more community service under her belt than I thought it was possible to have!!

This cornucopia and fabric vegetables were some of my very favorite items growing up.  I remember playing with them for hours.  I think my mom was afraid I was going to destroy them, but never!  I loved them too much.  I plan to add to this vegetable stash, in fact, now that she’s given me these precious items.

Tomorrow morning I shall be flying to Alaska to visit my brother for the holiday.  So exciting!  I’ve never been to Alaska before.  Have I mentioned I love fall!?!?

This polka-dot pumpkin is where I got my fascination with fabric pumpkins.  I LOVE this pumpkin.  Obviously, kitten does too!

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Crafting for Charity: Sewing for Babies

This week’s crafting for charity focuses on the mission of a group from Kansas and mostly from Nebraska that sews for infants.  Love seeing midwestern people!
The group, Sewing for Babies, makes garments and blankets for little ones - those who would otherwise go home with nothing, for tiny preemies that are hard to find garments for, and little outfits for infants who have passed on.

They meet in several locations to put together items for infants in the area.  These are some of the agencies they work with to provide these items.

I can’t say it better than they do, so here’s some information from the group’s mission.

We receive telephone calls from social workers in agencies and hospitals telling us they have newborns go home with nothing more than a car seat and a diaper. Our volunteers make it possible for us to provide a layette to those families consisting of quilts and blankets, receiving blankets, crib sheets, sleepers, gowns, caps, booties, and bibs as well as diapers, pacifiers, lotions and ointments when we have them. Since every child needs a toy, we also like to include a small stuffed animal. All items provided to these families are completely free of charge.

What an awesome group!

Clean Up Your Crafting Space

Yesterday I took a deep, deep breath and started to clean up my crafting space. Oy vey! What a job. It will never be perfect - but it’s a lot better. When I first moved into this current space, I was completely amazed how much junk I had. After years of living in cramped spaces, I’d compacted my crafting stuff down so far that I didn’t even know what I had anymore.

This is what my crafting space looks like. It’s kind of an attic space, an alcove that overlooks the living room upstairs next to the bedroom. The most important thing in there is that fan. It’s HOT in Texas, and HOT upstairs, and without that fan, I’d never use this space. The railing there in the foreground overlooks the stairs going down.

How to Organize?

For me, organization depends on what I’m doing, so first I always do an inventory. Do I need storage for yarn? Fabric? Pencils? Paper? Tools? Equipment? How much tabletop space is necessary? Are there magazines and other inspirational things to hold onto? Patterns to store? What can be thrown away? What sort of furniture/storage containers do I have available? Does anything need special storage? Do I need to keep things away from pets or in sealed bags? Do I have archival things?

Next thing is to sort it all out. Patterns in one pile, yarn in another, fabric in another, painting supplies in another. When you’re done, you’ll have an idea what size container you’re going to need to store it all in. Maybe you want to do some sub-sorting then. For example, you want to separate your paintbrushes from your paint tubes.

Here’s all my organization in this picture - a set of floor to ceiling shelves. Actually, there are two more shelves above this even. Everything is pretty well in its place.

One of the brown boxes has an embroidered quilt-in-progress in it. One of the envelope boxes has a skirt-in-progress and the other one has yarn. The bag on the end has my Christmas tree skirt. I SWEAR I’m going to finish that this year!! Most of my patterns, magazines, books etc. are on the top shelf there, and my tools and sewing notions in the second shelf. The top two shelves have more bulky sewing supplies like interfacing and stuffing, as well as my painting supplies.

A Place To Work

Crafting supplies tend to take up a helluva lot of space. I think that one thing that’s really important about a crafting space is to not forget that you need a place to work - to draw, to sew, to dream …. As much as storage, a place to spread out and get down and dirty is just as important as anything else.

This space below is where I am typing right now. The chair, I realize, doesn’t look that comfy but it is - go figure, but it’s padded wicker. I like “perching” on my chair when I’m sewing. That’s my stereo that usually goes on the shelf above, and on that shelf I keep the tools I use on a regular basis.

The basket holds basic sewing supplies - pincushion, seamripper, chalk, hem measurer, another pincushion, and some thread and empty bobbins. The blue box holds colored pencils, the dark blue box a glue gun and the brown box office supplies. The two little canisters hold matches (candles!) and sewing machine needles. They’re on a magnet strip, which usually holds whatever pattern I’m working on.

You can also see my scissors, embroidery hoops, my machine and various cutting mats. The foam is for pinning and stiffening crochet projects. My ironing board is hanging off to the right within easy reach. The magnetic strip on the front of my desk is for catching pins while sewing. I’ve stepped on pins before - ow!

Not shown is a big bulletin board I use for inspiration, but it has some big ol’ projects I’m contemplating in motion, so it stays mine for now

Books & ResourcesOne book I like on organization is Dream Sewing Spaces: Design & Organization for Spaces Large and Small or you can try the book Organizing your Craft Space, which I haven’t seen yet. For kind of a basic start, eHow and About.com and Squidoo have gathered some recommendations as well.

Really Cramped Space

If you’re really cramped on space, I suggest a tool box for your craft-making supplies. I have a tough canvas one I bought a long time ago that kept my craft stuff organized for about 10 years. I had my paintbrushes wrapped up, sitting alongside my exacto knife, woodburning kit, carving tools and graphite pencil. In another compartment was sandpaper, files, a glue gun with glue sticks, several types of scissors and a little mixing cup. One entire compartment held paint and colored pencils. I much prefer having more space, but that really worked well for a long time. I kept any fabric and yarn I had (I didn’t allow myself a stash then) in a box alongside it, packed tight.