I’m busy making my main studio space more usable… check out my progress AND enter my giveaway!
I give you a BEFORE tour
My main studio space is where I work all the time. It has my projects in progress, machines, computer, and most of my fabric.
About 3pm I started pulling all the projects out of my studio space to resort them and put them into better size container and more effective & productive spots for my use. I did a video for you
For the post part I’m not doing fabric, just projects.
That includes all the different products I review or test. PLUS I had some UFOs in my main space that were not being worked on and taking up valuable work space. They needed to be moved.
Taking it out is EASY.
Deciding how to regroup and where in my studio should it now be, is more difficult. I started when I got up.
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For our family business we work at home, so our whole small home has become our office.
We have no basement and no usable attic. So my business takes up 4 rooms in our home.
- My studio is my main work room and what you see all the time. It is the family room of our home, it’s what in the videos with my beautiful Koala Furniture and my Baby lock machines
- The shipping department has one room as his office.
- We have 1 other rooms for quilts, batting, notions, projects not being working on, other fabric, books, etc.
- AND the ‘over flow’ room right now is our dining room as it can’t all fit in the one room upstairs. The photo above is one wall in my dining room. On the wall is my village quilt (BUY the pattern here), and the blocks are from my Triangle book (HERE)
In my studio I keep JUST what I’m working on and my main fabric. On that video I talk about it being messy. It is ‘messy’ in that projects were not in optimum work places, split across areas, and things got put in spots that took up valuable space in my small room
Now for a few photos of my ‘after’
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Keeping it organized keeps my sanity 
Hope you enjoy watching as I make progress!
If you are new here, welcome! I run a lot of fun projects
These are my 2 latest FREE sew alongs, join me!
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1,818 Responses
my TWO biggest projects are not being able to throw away ANY fabric scraps and then starting too many projects before finishing current ones!
Not enough room to store or showcase my fabric. I have it everywhere!! Lol
As a quilter since the early 70s organizing my fabric has been the biggest challenge.
My biggest organization problem is my “sentimental attachment” and not everything needs to live with me. I must give away to others and free up my “life” and sewing area to ME. I am almost there. This is a BIG Life Shift.
I keep buying fabric!
Too much stuff in my room is my biggest problem. I’ve been sorting but it needs better organization!
My biggest problem is room. I lined a room with put together shelves and also am using fabric containers to put projects together or similar fabrics together. It works, but I also have to share my space with a home office. I’ve gotten to the point where I also have baskets on the floor underneath my sewing table with fabric and related items. It is what it is.
My biggest organizational problem space. I don’t have enough space to put everything in my sewing room. No matter how I organize my things it just doesn’t fit.
Too many in progress projects that I like to keep visible so I remember to work on them. As a result, they are scattered over every flat surface. Not real productive.
My biggest problem is having so much fabric stash but not being able to match enough pieces to make a nice quilt. Always have to go buy more pieces.
My biggest problem is having time to quilt- I like to keep projects out so when I have a few minutes I can go sew but then I start too many projects and it starts to get very messy- need to get all those UFO’s finished!!!!
Trying to decide what to keep and what to get rid of.
Probably my biggest organizational problem is I have too much space–terrible I know. What happens is that things get very organized around each work station but I haven’t labeled things, and though for the most part things are visible, what is in drawers or non see through boxes remains a mystery so I end up opening and closing things and drawers and waste a lot of time. Ideally there should be a complete set of needed stuff at each work station, but how many things can you own??
I hoard too muc
I would loves ideas on how to organize scraps. I would love a new machine that also does embroidery!!
My biggest organizational challenge is limited space with too many different crafts to organize. I’m also stuck with an odd conglomeration of cabinets that my husband bought and installed for his stained glass work. He died 5 1/2 years ago but I still have all the stuff, and I don’t have the construction skills he had to move/remove/replace those darn cabinets.
My biggest problem is keeping my fabric organized into the colour coded piles. Once of twice a year I sort and pile it up in neat stacks. But when I start a new project and pull out possibilities all those tidy stacks turn into sloppy heaps.
I tend to work on a few projects at the same time, so my main organizational problem happens when too many things from different projects get piled up on my cutting table…and then on the floor. Rulers, stacks of fabric, pattern instructions, rotary cutter, more fabric…yikes, what a mess! I know I should clean as I go, but I’d rather make progress on a project than take time to clean up. Eventually it gets so bad that I have about one square foot of space left to work in. That’s when I finally try to get organized.
Organization of my sewing space means sorting patterns, books, fabric and WIP. However, I’ve decided that I should be sorting all the time because I’m easily distracted if it is a stand-alone task. It’s hard to be creative and organized at the same time!
Figuring out which project to work on! I have no set organization for them. It gets sew overwhelming!
Space. I don’t have enough.
My biggest organizational problem is space. I have condensed, but still have four machines. I can’t part with three of them for sentimental reasons. I have limited my volume of books, but not fabric. 🙂 One can NEVER have too much fabric!
Oh, how I’d love to come sneak a peak at all of those boxes you have lined up along the wall. 😉
My biggest problem is space. I don’t have enough of it for the amount of fabric, patterns, books, and projects that I have going! I am afraid to open the closet door for fear everything will fall out! My daughter thinks I have a problem…..I say “No way!”
My biggest organizational problem is being organized. Lol. I don’t ever put things back where they go
My biggest problem is my scraps. No matter how many I use, there always seem to be more of them. I try to cut them into usable size with my accuquilt. That does help.
Too much stuff in too little space! I can’t throw anything away! I might “need” it in the next project.
Sorting fabrics and having a place for everything
My biggest problem is lack of space. I have way too much fabric. It is all in roller bins and a large built in unit but the bins are in front of the unit so my husband made a rack of roll out shelves for the bins which were all sorted by colour, but when I need to make a new project I have to sort through all the containers for co-ordinating fabrics. I also have too many machines and a large ironing table which my husband again made for me, plus a large cutting table which is always half covered by works in progress. I hang completed blocks together on skirt hangers to keep them smooth.
My biggest problem had been ruler and thread storage. Rulers were all over the place in my small sewing room. I dud not want to take up counter space so I decided to use the space behind the door. My husband put three’ll nails on the wall and I was able to hang up my various rulers. I could not believe how many duplicates that I had. On the back if the door we put an old spice rack and some thread racks I got on Amazon, I had over 100 spools of thread which I could not believe.
Now I am struggling with fabric storage.
Way too much of everything. I purchase faster than I can sew. This year I have been finishing a quilt every month and I barely made a dent on my stash. Thus creating a storage problem. Have given 2 SUV loads to charity…. made the Be my neighbor quilt all from my scraps but it just gave me more small scraps… lol … what can a girl do??
I have a problem when I get ALMOST everything organized and there is always stuff left. Things that I don’t know where to put them. Then I say to myself I’ll put this with that and I do it. If I go back a couple of days later I can’t remember what I put with what. I don’t know how to really organize it all so that I will know where everything is. I try to start a project and I waste half of my time trying to find what I need to do the project! SO FRUSTRATING!!! UGH!
I have too much stuff. After 30 years I need to downsize but it is so overwhelming. Guess I need to eat the frog on3 bite at a time. Lol.
I downsized to a small 1 bedroom apt. and I have too much fabric, etc. and seem to be just pushing things around without coming up with a solution. I think I need to spread everything out and sort it but I don’t have room to do that. Congrats on dong your reorg.
New scissors ! Can’t have enough scissors. I’m a lefty💕💕
Space. I live in a very small house and fabric is everywhere. Thank goodness my husband is not bothered by it.
I have sew much fabric and projects and not enough time! I’ve been folding and sorting my stash and projecta and I have totes just like yours that I am using.., now out of space. Goal for the year… a project a month. I’ll let you know how it goes! I love your blog, books and emails! Keep me coming! PS I’d love to win a prize! 😁
Fabric – way too much fabric not organized into project boxes. Way too many projects started. I just hate to cut one piece for machine embroidery applique off a new yard of fabric for fear I bought that yard and will need every inch for some other project. Deciding whether to sort fabric as a color or based on projects is another problem.
My biggest problem is that I keep all the fabric I buy so I have too much. I save all the scraps and cant let go of any fabric🙄
My biggest problem is finishing the projects. I get overwhelmed 😞
My problem is my attic room has a sloped ceiling so I have no vertical space. I have run out of storage for fabric in the dresser and 4 totes. we will be retiring in 18 mos so the new house will have a better designed room for sewing.
My biggest problem is I scrapbook and make cards also. I spend more time quilting but everything is in one room so I have a separate area for other crafts.
Fabric storage is my main problem. I have way too much! (LOL, don’t we all!) Right now, because I have a lot of sunlight coming in my sewing studio, I have my fabric in canvas storage drawers in a cube system and also some in plastic storage tubs. I would like to come up with a more accessible and sunproof way of storing my fabric and be able to see what I have when I start a project. I have thought of tinting the windows, but I love the light, so what should I do?
My big problems are knowing where to start, not enough storage (i.e. shelves or drawers ) and having all my card making stuff in the same room! Just work around it all or shut the door and read a book or get on pinterest for a bit.
My biggest problem is too many projects and too little time for them all.
My biggest organizational challenge is, I have no organizational skills. I have no real space. I’m my own worst enemy.
tnaseet@gmail.com
I so need to organize my fabric !
My biggest organizational challenge is, I have no organizational skills. I have no real space. I’m my own worst enemy.
My biggest organizational problem is storage. I keep my fabric in plastic containers, sorted by color, but need to get some shelves to put them on. My whole house is my sewing room, so some days I can’t sit down on my living room furniture.
My biggest issue is how best to store the multitude of fabric that I have so that I can find what I need, when I need/want it instead of buying something else because I can’t find what I know I have somewhere!
My biggest problem is I have too many projects that I’m working on at once, so I have piles for each project every where or bins everywhere. So happy when I finish one and clean it out