take a tour

Here's a little tour of my sewing room, not quite done, but way better than before!

The room is supposed to be the dining room and is the second room you see when you walk into the house. There is no way to close it off from visitors, so we don't have visitors over very often :)

I built a wall out of these stacking crates. There are 20 cubbies now for storing fabric. I still have to get my daughter to help me sort the fabric by size and color, but that will take some time. In the back corner is the bookshelf, overstuffed with quilting, knitting and crocheting books. I think there are even some gardening books back there. You can see the chair to the sewing table. To the right of this picture is a window for light. My sewing machine looks out to the side yard where the trampoline is. When it isn't broken, the kids love to jump on it with the sprinklers on. It is time to order a new jumping pad for the trampoline, they use it a lot.

On the top of the crate, on the right side is the pile of quilts, waiting to be bound. There are about 12 quilts in that pile, maybe more. I will have to bind them when the pile falls on my head. That's the sign that I have too many waiting for their turn. See the long skinny strips hanging from the crate on the right? Those are my binding strips, waiting to be used. I had about 20 of them when I first started binding this week. Now it looks like there are 4 left.

On the end of the stacking crates I have my quilt tops that need matching backs. I have about 20 of them. Since taking this picture, I added another 10 along the front of the crates. My daughter informed me this wansn't a good idea because now you can't really see the fabric in the top two crates, which means I need to quilt faster. On the very top, here on the end are the finished quilts, ready to be delivered to church tomorrow. I think there are 8 done. I may get a couple more done today, maybe not. I have a cold and don't feel very well. I'm tired, with a sore throat and stuffy nose. I should really take a nap. Bah.

If you look to the left of this picture, you see that you will go down the half stairs into the TV room and there is my cutting table, with the laundry basket on it. That holds the current project for my daughter's quilt. I was working on it yesterday and there it sat, waiting for me to come back. The ironing board is to the left of that table. Under that table are 10 rolls of batting. JoAnn's was having lots of coupons the last couple of weeks and I got all of their bags of 10 yards of batting at 50% off. I go through batting quickly, getting about 6 quilts from 10 yards, so this will keep me busy for a while, until they have some more good coupons for me to use.

Here is the quilting machine. It is along the only full wall in the room. There is about 2 feet between the wall and the machine. I have to be able to get in behind it to do the quilting. On the wall are some thread holders. Looks like I need to buy more thread :) Lots of empty space there. I'm making a list of the colors I need and will get them for Christmas. You can see my serger on the table to the left of the picture. It is not useable on this table, but if I need it, I can just switch it with the sewing machine for the time I need it. And yes, that is a spinning wheel in the picture. I'm a jack of all trades, master of none!

My quilting machine is a Janome 1600DB P and a Handi Quilter frame, both of them my mom gave me last summer. They sure have gotten a lot of use! Thanks again mom (and dad of course).

Under this table are three plastic storage carts for sorting scraps. I have 6 1/2 inch squares, 4 1/2 inch squares and strips cut. There are also a couple of junk drawers. I don't know why I have so many junk drawers, but like I said, I'm still working on fixing things up to be super user friendly.

And finally, here is the quilt you saw in the last picture on the machine, all done except for the binding. This top was in one of the bags that was sitting on the table waiting for me at the last Binky Patrol meeting that nobody showed up to so I have no idea who made it. I love the colors and it is really big! Twin size for sure. Just a simple meander all over the quilt and it is good to go.

I am almost done with the scraps of batting that have been given to me. You saw in the last picture the batting with the hole in it. I got a whole bunch of pieces of batting last year and it has just been sitting around taking up space. I got a space bag and squished it all down, so it didn't take up so much space, but then decided to just use it all up as fast as I could. I think the last 10 quilts have used the 'free' batting. I love it!

I hope you get to do something you really enjoy today. I'm loving my vacation. Every minute of it, even the not feeling so good ones. At least I'm not stuck in a room with 32 teenagers :)

Phil 4:6: Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.