Small Craft Room Makeover

I have the small box room in our house as my craft room. Unfortunately it has also been used as a place for items that have had no home of their own or are in transition from one room to another. I do give it a good sort through now and again, but space is so tight as it's only just over 5' by 7', I did a post about it last year here.

I decided the time had come to give it a proper makeover, I've seen other tiny rooms on pinterest made over and looking quite gorgeous as well as functional. I'm so thrilled with it that I have to show it off to you... I have a very wonderful husband who put everything together for me.

This is where my chair is, I have a desk in front of me and at the side too.

This is the desk at the side

Pegboard is so useful and if I had the wall space I'd have more pegboard!

The shelf we bought has hooks underneath, making the most of every piece of storage.

These little cubby holes are full of ink pads.

My little Ikea trolley is so useful and great for attaching my magnetic tins to.

These Ikea drawers are fab for storing all my bits and pieces in and make great supports for the desks instead of legs. The trio of baskets are just the thing for storing ribbons, it means I can see them easily too.

I used to have my cutting dies stored in a dvd tower, but I've streamlined them and arranged them on a shelf. On the shelf below I have jars with flowers and buttons, the one above has things that I don't need as often, such as scrapbooks.

I tried to be really ruthless when I was sorting through everything and put quite a few stamps and cutting dies on eBay and gave others to charity. Checked through supplies that i've had for a long while and threw away items that were no longer of any use or past their best. I'm not always good at throwing things out or moving them on, but I was ruthless (much to Andy's delight).

I still have some bits and pieces to do, I need a blind for the window as it's south facing and I don't want my lovely bits and pieces to fade in the sun. I have to say though, I'm very thrilled with how everything looks and how accessible it all seems to be (I have a lovely chair with wheels on it so it's easy to turn from one desk to another).

Now I just need to find the time to create lots of things and make sure no one uses it to store anything other than my crafting supplies...

 Take care
xxx

For the Boys

Thank you for the lovely comments regarding my dad. After the dreadful mix ups by the hospital last week, the lovely Macmillan nurse has taken it all in hand and has it under control so my mum doesn't have to worry about ringing around trying to sort appointments out or chase things up.

Time has gone by in a flash, as it often does. It's only 5 1/2 weeks until our grandson is due to arrive in the world, although I think that has passed much quicker for us than it has for Adam and his girlfriend, isn't that usually the way though! They spent last weekend decorating the nursery, I haven't seen it yet, so I'm looking forward to seeing some photos when it's finished.

My latest make for the expected arrival, is a cardigan. I really enjoyed making it as it was a pattern I used when I was expecting my own son. I hadn't realised I still had the pattern, but found it when having a bit of a declutter!

It's a nice simple pattern and didn't take long to make in some soft, double knit yarn I already had.

I think it's quite sweet and I also have the memories of Adam wearing the ones I knitted for him many years ago.

Here's a picture of Adam in one of the cardigans I knitted with the same pattern. I remember making them in lemon and a mint colour as I didn't know if I was having a son or a daughter. I can hardly believe this little baby is 29 and about to have his own baby!

I forgot to show the card I made for my husband, Andy the other week. I haven't made a card for a while so thought it would be more personal if I did. I've had these marker pens for quite a few years and some are past their best now, so thought I should get some more use from them before they give up on me.

A rubber stamp of a little boy going to play cricket, just as Andy did when he was young.

I enjoyed making it. My craft room has had a transformation and is a pleasure to be in, but I think I'll save that for another post.

Take care
xxx

Oh Christmas Tree

I'm starting to get a bit excited now, only one week left at school then the Christmas holidays will be upon us. All the decorations are up, the tree lights are twinkling, I've posted all my Christmas cards (I may sound a little smug here as I'm usually a bit of a last minute person) and wrapped quite a few presents. We've also started watching Christmas films, so far have watched Scrooge (the musical one with Albert Finney), The Grinch, Deck the Halls and The Santa Clause. I'm sure we'll watch another one over the weekend.

I took part in a Christmas card swap organised by Amy at Love Made my Home. I was paired with the lovely Jules from A Hidden Jem and she sent me this beautiful card

I love the holly and berries in the corner

With all this Christmas wonderfulness happening, I thought it only right that as I seem to be spending a lot of time felting, I should make something Christmassy. I had this wool roving in gorgeous shades of green.

I started with a polystyrene cone

and gave it a covering with the dark green.

Just with one of my coarser needles, I pricked and stabbed until the cone was covered.

Once covered, I started to build up with shades of green

When I was happy with the coverage and colour, I used thin strands of red and gold to make the tinsel and small baubles on the tree and a piece of gold to make a star for the top.

I hope you like it, I'm hoping to make some more with some different sized cones that I have so they can all sit together on the mantlepiece.

How are everyone else's preparations coming along?

Take care
xxx

Craft Room

I'm very lucky to have a little space in our house that has been labelled my craft room. When our son grew up and left home, our daughter moved from her tiny bedroom to his old room and I staked my claim on the box room. It's a very tiny room, more like a large cupboard than a bedroom! I used to do a lot of paper crafting, making cards and spent many a happy hour scrapbooking, being in the craft room kept the mess/creative process in one place making it a bit easier.

We had our own business, a shop until a few years ago. When we decided to close the shop it meant there was a lot of old stock to house... yes, you know where I'm going with this, my poor little room became a dumping ground for all sorts, it became a junk room.

I have reclaimed my room, we've been emptying it gradually over time, selling things, donating lots to charity and throwing things away.There's still stuff in the loft that needs to be dealt with, but I think we're on the winning side at last.

I've been spending time over the last few months, sorting out drawers and making the room more useable.

The drawers are full of card, stamps, embellishments and other paraphernalia.

So many papers for scrapbooking.

My wonderful husband made me a workspace from a piece of conti board. It goes from wall to wall so make good use of the available space. Here's picture of the desk looking a bit messy (though far better than it has), in front of the window so I have lots of light. In the middle is my little oven that I use for baking fimo/modelling clay.

I haven't really done any paper crafting for a long time, preferring to crochet the last few years as well as using fabric and felt. I made a couple of cards towards my Christmas stash so I could feel I'd been a little creative as well as all the tidying.

To end with, here's a quote from a man who must be one of the greatest children storytellers of all time, Roald Dahl. How very true I find this...

Take care
xxx