Organizing...and finding treasure..

As you know, I've been going through boxes, and I've found some cool things. While moving things around I actually found 2 checks I can still cash.....woohoo! And I found these appliqued pillows. They were given to me by an exchange student from Egypt. At the time they didn't go with anything in my room, but look at how well they go now! I love that. 

Hawkeye loves pillows. He tries to use all of them he can.

Organizing...my way.

I've been organizing, and I've been doing it my way, which is why I'm organizing my art room, but you are seeing a picture of the corner of my bedroom. Makes perfect sense, right?

One thing seems to lead to another. My art room was FULL of boxes and many of them contained books. Boxes of books are heavy. I just wanted to put them away, not cart around heavy boxes. At first glance it seemed there was no place in my little house for more shelves, but I had these two little white shelves in the attic. I carried them down and found that I could squeeze them behind the chair in the bedroom if I stacked them on top of each other. I filled them with the books and now I have more space to walk in the art room. I will attach these to the wall so they cannot be turned over, since once in a while I have little ones in the house.

Lately I've been embracing my own way to organize or do chores. I alternate the chores and the fun stuff.  I do something that I've been putting off, such as cleaning out a junk drawer or emptying boxes that have been waiting since I moved here a year ago. Or if I'm going a pretty big project like organizing the art room, I do a little chunk of it, like sort through a few boxes, or clear off and organize a shelf or two. Then I do something fun.....like hang some pictures that I've been meaning to get up, or hanging the bird feeder I want outside the art room window. I pick something that make my eyes happy...and that can be done in a fairly short amount of time. Then back to doing another shelf or two. It works for me.

I learned this from my Mom, and as usual she was right. If I painted a room, I started and plowed through it, and was exhausted at the end. Mom would get her paint brush out and do the trim around just he windows and then quit, and do other things. Then the next day she'd do some more.  She keeps after it until it's done but she doesn't beat herself up doing it. And her house always looks nice. It's the same amount of work, of course, but pacing yourself, and rewarding yourself with fun breaks can make a big difference.

Every time I see that chair I smile. I got it at an auction for 2 dollars, and I've gotten soo many years of use out of it.

Studio Time

"You're a businesswoman, a wife, a mom, a world traveler, and you're knitting socks. You've got it all."

A friend recently said this to me, and I loved it. It's a little off, since I haven't been out of the United States yet, but hey, I like it! Actually, what he said was that I am knitting him some socks, but I'm not, so I edited it. I may have to start on those socks now though, just to show him how much I appreciate this quote! Thank you Scott Langford of the Grand Rapids Press.

We were talking about having a lot of interests. I've always envied those who have a driving passion for a particular hobby, job or interest. It must be so much simplier and rewarding. Concentrating on one thing would enable you to really become expert in that area.

I'm a dabbler. I hate being pinned down and want to do it all. Right now, I'm trying to clean out my sewing room, and this tendency of mine is causing problems. I can't get rid of that soldering iron and such because I intend to make some collaged pendants under glass. How about the rug hooking supplies? Well, I'm still intrigued by that too. The journaling/drawing stuff (and there is a lot of it!) has to stay because I actually use it often. The sewing stuff must stay. The knitting stuff stays, but I can definitely get rid of all the acrylic yarn. I've become a yarn snob I fear, and I love the natural fibers. The vintage fabric stays, too. And then there's all the vintage book pages and ephmemera which I'm actually starting to use...working them into my drawings. The scrapbooking stuff....well, maybe I need to face reality there.

The good thing is that much of the supplies will be moved to the shop, where I'm setting up a little studio (in the picture above). When I'm done, sewing supplies will be at home and much of the rest of the artsy stuff will be at the shop. I only want to move what I will actually use though, and what inspires me. The rest will have to go to the charity shop.

On the Shelf

I bought a couple of cheap shelves at Lowes, and I needed a phillips head screwdriver. For some reason no matter how many we have...there's never one where it's supposed to be in this house. Hubby went out and came back with a screwdriver just for me. Maybe this one won't disappear!


Here are the shelves all put together. Our house is cottage sized and has very small closets. We are always looking for more storage. I put hubby's shoes on the bottom shelf where they don't show much. I still want to doll this shelf up with a dresser scarf and some accessories. I need to rearrange the pictures and I'm planning to paint all the frames white. Holy moly, I still have a lot to do!


I'm a magazine junkie...I admit it. This is just a little portion of the ones I couldn't throw out. We are a reading family, yet we only have one bookshelf in the house. Now we have a little more. I splurged on a couple of those Shabby Chic baskets at Target. As Dot mentioned in her comment on the last post, there are a lot of things needed for everyday life that you almost never see in a decorating magazine. Like the Kleenex box. I have it in that top basket where hopefully it doesn't show as much but is still easy to reach. And of course you don't see shoes stored out in the open too much either. I want everything to be pretty, but I really want it to work too.

Mom, can we go for a walk now?

Gardening, Organizing, Modeling

Believe it or not, that's what has been happening at our house today. Here's a new plant on my kitchen windowsill. I hope it does as well as the orchids have there. I love the baby fine foliage on this plant.
Still working on the studio. I have been pitching ruthlessly. But some things are harder than others. I can't tell you how many pairs of little boy and girl clothes I made out of these two patterns. Many of the scraps are in these strip pieced bits above. So I finally pitched the patterns...surely all the pieces might not be there anyway, but I kept the strips. Maybe I'll make some place mats with those bits in them.
I started these heart quilt blocks in high school. I was using scraps and sheeting and regular sewing thread to quilt with....and doing each block individually without really knowing how I'd put them all together. I saved these too, just because I don't have that many things that I worked on while growing up. We moved alot and you weed stuff out when you move often. Maybe I can think of something to make out of these too.
Modeling. My brother-in-law takes amazing photos using the same CannonS3IS as I have. He has actually learned to use all the settings and such and pushes that little camera to the max. Plus, as you can see, he has bought and made some extra flashes and backdrops. If I were independently wealthy I'd buy him the nicest Nikon digital out there and set him up in business...'cause he'd certainly make a success of it! He took our daughter's senior pics, and today he took some more of her and her best friend.
Such cutie pies. I took this one...his are amazing.