Still Re-organizing

Have you ever noticed when you start reorganizing any area, the project just grows and grows. First I started with my fabric -- 5 very large bins of sizeable pieces (1 yard or more). That lead to going through my small bins of scraps -- 26 bins and I condensed them down to 16. Next it was the miscellaneous craft supplies -- too many bins and containers to count. Then there was the scaling down the sewing machines and sergers I own. That was an especially tough task, and so far only one is slated for the garage sale pile. In the process of checking the back recesses of the garage I discovered two more bins of fabric, a bin of purse making supplies and two more bins of scrapbooking/card making supplies. Does it ever end? I'm determined to get rid of much. But the mess just keeps growing! In the last hour I pulled down all my decoration bins from shelves in the garage. This isn't Christmas decorations, but spring, fall, winter, valentine, Easter, etc. That's another 6 large bins! Yikes -- this may take more than a week to finish. (This picture is the shelves in my studio before emptying them and deciding what stays and what goes). When it's all complete I'll post pictures of my brand new, less cluttered studio (I hope).

Reorganizing

I've spent most of the day reorganizing my studio. I'm moving things around, eliminating a lot and donating a lot. Hopefully I can downsize. That's a hard task when you are a collector of fabric, quilt patterns, sewing machines, magazines, etc. There's more here than I could ever accomplish in my lifetime, so it's time to eliminate much of this clutter. Now that I have use of the walk-in closet in my studio, most of my sewing/quilting supplies will go in there. My goal is not to have more than I can store in the closet. I would like my studio free of all clutter. That's a lofty goal -- especially for me. Here's a couple pictures of the closet.

Christmas Greetings

Merry Christmas to everyone who reads this blog. My stat counter statistics show that there are somewhere between 700 and 1,000 views each month. I know many of you are fellow quilters. It's a joy to share my life in my quilts but also personally.
This Christmas day has been very quiet. Only some of my family is here today. We have snacked, played games, worked on a puzzle, played with our Christmas presents and enjoyed each others company. It's been a great day.
I will not start quilting again until after the first of the new year. It's nice to have a good long break. Next week I will hopefully reorganize much of my quilt studio. With my daughter getting married, the walk-in closet that was hers (in my studio) is now ready to house my things. I would like to do some major sorting of quilt paraphernalia and have a whole lot less of everything. We'll see how that goes :)

Wedding is Over

I can't believe the wedding is over. So much effort is poured into one day that when it's done there's not only this huge sigh of relief but also a let-down feeling that seems to come -- "so now what do I do"! I feel like Christmas is somewhat anti-climatic after the wedding. But there's still much to do to get ready for Christmas. I haven't quite finished shopping and there's some baking still to do. Anthony and Charissa will be here on Christmas eve day and then head to his parents home for Christmas day. Then they are off to California to live. It will be hard to have them that far away. It probably is only for 6 months so that helps.
The wedding was beautiful. Because it was a small chapel and dark, all the lights and candles made it one of the prettiest weddings ever. Both my sisters were here and were so much help. I had 4 nieces and nephews that also helped so much. This wedding could not have been done without them. We had about 4 hours to decorate and have a rehearsal. Everything went very smoothly. Her dress was beautiful too. I'm glad I made it. Not sure I would do another but it was a very special labor of love and she looked radiant in it.

The Wedding Dress

Last night I finished the rest of the detail work on the wedding dress. The flowers were all attached to the organza layer. I made a loop and sewed on a button so that her train can be bustled for the reception and a little black jacket that she used at her high school prom was altered to wear at the reception and when she leaves. We have one more 'try on' to make sure everything is right and then the dress will get carefully put in a dress bag for the wedding day. I'm so glad to be to this point. This dress was a lot of work, but I am pleased with the final result.

Re-Upholstery

I've always been pretty bold about tackling some home project -- even if I don't necessarily have the skill or know how! I'm a firm believer that you can teach yourself just about anything. There's always ways to learn how to do things; from others who have the skill, from books, and now from the internet. There's a U-Tube video on just about anything you want to know about.
I have re-upholstered several chairs in the past. It's not that easy to do and I'm certainly no expert. But when I found these chairs and footstool on Craig's List for $100.00, that was my first thought -- I could re-upholster them. I bought them, got them home and then started to think about how difficult it might be and the cost of upholstery fabric (it's not cheap). My search for fabric finally yielded the result of a purchase with coupons for about $10.00 per yard. I needed almost 14 yards to do the chairs and stool and I bought everything the store had of the fabric and it was only 12 yards. That was risky but I thought the stool could be done in a different fabric and color. It ended up that I didn't need that much so with the chairs done, there is still enough fabric left for the stool. Because of other changes in our living room, dining room and kitchen I'm decorating with black as an accent color. So the fabric had to have black in it. It also needed to be a sturdy enough fabric to withstand a lot of use. I really like what I found. It took me about 3 days to recover the chairs. The longest most tedious task was pulling all the staples out. It's hard to believe how many were in the chairs -- it had to be over a 1,000. My hands ached after a whole day of tearing the chairs apart. The original fabric was used to make a pattern for the new fabric. Putting it back together was fairly simple. I purchased an electric staple gun but after a day of use took it back. It was a 'piece of junk'. My husband went and bought a pneumatic staple gun for me to use. That was a dream and other than my being startled every time the air compressor ran, it worked so well. The work is not perfect and I learned much through the process. I reused the metal tack strips and would not do that again. I should have purchased new strips. These chairs go in one end of my dining room. I'll post pictures of the whole room with the Christmas decorations soon.

A Few More Customer Quilt Photos

Here's some more pictures of several customer quilts that were done in November.