Overhaul

This weekend, my sewing time was devoted to starting to sort and unearth things in the super, over-the-top, clutter in my sewing room.  

For a long time, I've been looking for a replacement for the little plastic drawers that are home to notions, tools, floss, and embellishments.  They are so full that, as you can see, they are no longer functional at all.  I scored this lovely little drawer unit at an estate sale.

(Of course, part of the reason those drawers are so full is that I keep picking up odds and ends and extra needles and snaps and a really cool old wooden darning egg, etc., etc., etc., at those great estate sales.....)

So anyhow, I sorted and re-organized and culled, and now the old drawers are empty enough to work again, and there is space for them up on top of some short shelves, and the new drawers are in place and also not overly full.

There are piles and piles of things you can't see in this photo.  

The room is very, very crowded.  When we moved into the house 20+ years ago, I used two bedrooms for my stuff.  Then we had our kids "move in", and I scrunched things into this one room and a corner of my husband's office.  Then I branched out from just the quilt biz into the costuming thing as well.  So my supplies stash expanded in quality and therefore quantity at the same time my space was cut in half.  That's my excuse, anyway.  

I don't think I can bear to publish "before" photos, but I'll be sure to show you the lovely "after" photos!  

Here are close-ups of a couple of the things on the wall:  first, a clock I made many years ago, using a mariner's compass block. 

And second, a lovely little oil painting by my Uncle Ken.  He took up painting as a retirement activity.  I love this one especially.  It really sums up his sense of humor and style.  He lived in northern England, and retired to a little stone house called Ivy Cottage that was built in the 1850s or so.  I made him a pillow with the English Ivy block when he moved in.

Between this rainy October evening, when the world is closing down for the winter, and the sorting through old photos and piles this afternoon, well, it's not surprising I'm indulging in a bit of nostalgia.