My Craft Space

Welcome!

It's not really a room with four walls and a door but it is my own little corner with my own little chair(s). :)
In our last house, I had a monstrous metal desk and a couple of bookshelves in the corner of our family room. It was great to be able to craft and still be part of the action but if I had ongoing projects laying out, it tended to look messy. And, that was only my paper crafting area. My beads were over in the office area of the family room, and my sewing and misc. craft supplies were in the laundry area of the unfinished part of the basement. I had supplies organized but they were all in different areas.

Then we moved. This house has a full unfinished basement but it's a nice basement (high, open ceilings; smooth concrete floor; a brick wall (we're not sure why); and a brick (working!) fireplace. They even had built in a room of sorts on one side. It's all paneling but totally workable. MacGyver hubby pulled some lighting fixtures out of his stash and adding lighting in his shop area, the family room section, and in my new craft 'room'.

Then.... water. I had painted the paneling, hung curtains, painted doors and trim, put down a carpet remnant, and gotten all my crafties set up perfectly. But it was not meant to be! It rained, and we got water. Not a lot but enough to make me move everything out. We are thankful that nothing was ruined. We had to hang the carpet from the ceiling with clamps to dry out but it's still usable. We're hoping that with lots of regrading outside, gutter fixing, and some landscaping, the water issue is now resolved. To not take chances though, my space got moved to the back corner of the basement, which looked like this.

The really icky 'before'.

I think I like it back there. I can leave things out and no one will see them, and I can go relax by myself (on rare occasions.) Are you ready for some pics? After a serious cleaning and painting, it looks more like this.

My new set-up has 1 less wall than before so we got 2 Deka curtain wire and clips sets and 3 Knoppa flat sheets from Ikea to hang as a divider. The one on the right is where my entry is and hides this antique hutch. This was a wedding gift from a family friend and has been teal, mint green with a crackle finish, and now a glossy white. I found some light blue eyelet fabric at JoAnn's and made a panel for the door. We hung it with 2 very short, very thin curtain rods. 

 

The hutch holds

craft paints and paintbrushes,
beads and jewelry supplies,
my button tin for random sewing project buttons and clothing repair,
embroidery floss and cross-stitch supplies,
bath and candle making things,
misc craft bits and seashells.
The drawer has 'projects to be', kid's small craft kits (great for summer boredom,) and a small tool box that has assorted hardware, tape, clips, hangers, and a few small tools. On top I have a large plastic tote with big yardage pieces of fabric.

To the left of the hutch on the back wall, is my sewing area.

 

The antique desk and chair were refinished by my mom and given to me for a birthday gift when I was a teenager. The drawers hold sewing patterns, my foot pedal and power cord, sewing machine manual, and my glue gun and glue sticks. I made the machine cover with some fabric that's been in my stash forever. I only had maybe 1 yard total so I had to make it stretch. The backing of the cover is some blue fabric I had too. Above the sewing machine is a French memo board that the hubs and I made with a window from our last house. I also painted a cheesy clock from our last house that hadn't yet found a home in this house to match the space.

Looking to the left are the 2 bookshelves that hold the majority of my papercrafting supplies.

(TOP) On top in the white boxes are 'cards to send' and my complete card stash, printed pictures (from our pre-digital days), and empty CD cases (for unmounted stamps). Next to them on the top are 4 little boxes of fabric scraps and my sewing supply case. (My grandmother made it for me.)

(FIRST SHELF) Scrapbooks! Labeled ones are complete; unlabeled are yet to be used.

(2nd SHELF) Envelopes in the white box. Next to it is a white lunch tin that I covered. It holds handmade cards sent from family and friends that I like to keep. 

 

The 2 blue boxes next to it hold scrapbook sketches (glued to index cards and sorted by number of pics in the layout) and extra supplies. The other bookshelf has photo albums with extra printed pics that were worth keeping.

(3rd SHELF) Paper!!! I keep cardstock separate from my patterned paper. Cardstock is sorted by rainbow order (ROY G BIV, then neutrals.) Patterned paper is sorted the same way except for certain theme paper that I use frequently or have a lot of like Christmas, baby, school, family, etc. Then 2 binders with templates and scrapbook ideas. (I added decorative paper to the spines.) Last on this shelf is 3 magazine holders (painted with leftover kitchen paint) with scrapbook idea books and my beading idea books (they don't fit in the hutch.)

(4th SHELF) Small embellishments and ribbon are housed in Cropper Hopper cases. Then I keep all my letter size cardstock. Some extra organizers, small craft books, a tin with our wedding pics, and my Xyron (covered with a left-over bit of blue eyelet fabric.)

(BOTTOM SHELF) At the bottom, I have theme albums in progress stored in the large 12x12 paper holder. Then 2 partially finished albums of my DH's college trip to the Holy Lands. Next to them are card magazines and idea books, Sheetload templates, old stamping catalogs, crafty gift idea books, and a couple of binders with home/decor ideas and info.

Moving to the left of the tall bookshelves is my Cricut, Sizzix, small tool area. Above I have a shelf that I used as a little girl holding some decorative things and all my Cricut cartridges and Gypsy. Below is a new purchase: a cheapy bookshelf that holds my Cricut (with matching dust cover). I can cut right from there so no moving the machine around. Love it!

On the shelves are my Sizzix dies and old 'Big Red,' still going strong!
The next shelf has baskets with my CM cutting templates, then , and then my punches.
The bottom shelf holds stamping supplies (chalk and walnut inks,) Nestabilities and Cuttlebug embossing folders, and Cricut accessories and extra blades.

The best part.... I got this idea from someone else's blog but it was a long time ago and I didn't save my inspiration. (Sorry!) I stuck a Command hook on the side to hold all of my cutting mats.

Another view of the Cricut shelf.

Moving left again (on the back wall), is my stamp holder. We pulled this little unit out of the trash. Macgyver hubby cut a few new shelves to replace some missing ones. A little clean-up and it has become the perfect solution for my unmounted stamps. (I used to be a TAC demo which is why I have so many!) I keep my loose mounted stamps in the basket on top and mounted sets (like Stampin' Up) on the lower shelves. It also holds my ink spot and dewdrop inks and my stamp cleaning pads. Next to it on the table are a marker holder (a freebie from a former workplace) and a basket with my acrylic stamp mounts.

On the side wall in this corner, I hung my embellie shelf, another MacGyver hubby project. This was the only drawer in our former kitchen. When we redid the kitchen, we kept the drawer and added shelves. It hung in our son's room at the last house but didn't fit in his new room. I took it over, gave it a fresh coat of white paint on the top, and added my pretties. To keep the canning jars looking more uniform, I sprayed all the lids with a coat of oil rubbed bronze paint.

Below the embellie shelf, just above the table, hangs this Re-Store corkboard project. Again the hubs handy skills came in, well, handy. We found cork rolls and this cabinet door frame at the Re-Store years ago. I painted it blue to match the decor, and he assembled and hung the whole thing for me.

We had this little organizer unit left over from our old house's linen closet. Now I keep large adhesives and office supply needs in the top drawer, full-size ink pads and my watercolor crayons in the second drawer, and random things to attend to in the bottom. On top is a little basket (perhaps temporary until I find something I like better) holds scrapbook left-overs that need to be put away. 

Here's the whole left hand wall set up. I made a little curtain for the ground level window with fabric scraps to match the sewing machine and Cricut covers. (This was my last sewing project with this fabric so I had to piece and piece and piece it together to make it fit. It's not gathered too much!) You can also see my TV, VCR (I'd love a DVD player someday but MacGyver hubby rigged up a switcher thing so that if I turn on the Wii, for Netflix, or the DVD player in the family room, I can see the same thing on this TV. The VCR is nice when he's home and wants to do something else with the family room TV but during the day---it's all MINE!,) and a radio/CD player.

We made a shelf from a $1.99 cabinet piece from the Ikea 'as-is' section. We also got 4 brackets on clearance there for $0.25 each. I covered the adjustable shelving holes on the white piece with contact paper and put them facing up so you'd never know it wasn't a shelf to begin with!
On the shelf, I have a basket with longer ribbon pieces. 2 jars with flower embellies, a basket with embellies that don't fit in my Cropper Hopper cases, and 2 binders with stickers/die cuts/assorted flat embellishments. {The binders are sorted into 4 sections: alpha/numeric, theme, season (winter, spring, summer, fall), and color (if they didn't fit into any other category.)}

 

Hanging above is another cute idea that I saw in the Creating Keepsakes Creative Spaces special edition mag. I took 3 strands of patio lights that we had left-over from a VBS and then wound pink tulle around the strand between the bulbs. It has a soft, pretty glow when they're plugged in!

 

We sold the monstrous desk before we moved so now I'm using 2 folding tables that Bass got free from work after a remodel there. One is on the left wall (previous pics). The other I set up as an 'L' and it is up against the wall o' curtain. This is where I do my main working. The tables were a little beat up with marker and paint marks all over them and some chipping laminate, so I covered them with contact paper. It took 2 rolls I think to do both. Now it's a nice, bright, clean finish that's easy to wipe off.

 

It has my file box of paper scraps. (I labeled it, in case all the random bits sticking out the top didn't clue you in. *giggle*)

Then I have my tool caddy (JC Penney enabling years ago via two peas) on a lazy susan (goodwill find!) It's cute, and it spins! *love*
I keep all of my small tools, bottle glues, scissors, pens/pencils, and watercolor and skin tone pencils in it.

Next up, this little basket that I repurposed from our last house. It now holds all my dry adhesives and my ATG. I really, really thought I wanted a wood ATG stand but then I realized that it sits really well in this basket and it means one less thing on my work space.

 

My other comfy chair with recovered seat and slip over the back.

 

Under the table are my travel scrapbook bag with slipcover (thanks to my mother-in-law's mad phat sewing skills, yo!) and 2 file crates with memorabilia to be sorted through as I catch up in the scrapbooks. It either goes in the book, gets written about in the book, or gets pitched. But until I get there (I'm still scrapping 2005), I just tuck things into folders for each year so I don't lose them.

 

The last little bit of my space isn't actually in my space at all! It's a dresser with all of my gift wrap supplies in it. Bows and toppers on the top along with tissue and gift bags. I keep ribbon, assorted boxes, formula cans and other random packaging, and party supplies in here. It's just on the other side of the curtain.

So here's a reminder of the 'oh, my' before:

And the 'oh, so much better' after:

I'm not linking up here but if you want more craft/art space ideas, check out this cool blog: Where Bloggers Create by Karen at My Desert Cottage.
I'm linking up to these weekly parties.