My Studio: Temporarily Imperfect Reality

So, you may have noticed blogging has been a bit light of late.  That's because I've had some big news that I was asked not to share publicly, but the cat is now out of the proverbial bag - my family is moving to Wisconsin!  It's been crazy as my husband has started his new job in Menominee Falls (Milwaukee suburbs), we've put our Chicagoland home on the market and house hunted around Milwaukee.  We'd like to land in the Hartland/Delafield area, but have to wait for our house to sell to buy there.  And all before the start of school . . . .

View from the door

So, before it becomes a pile of boxes, and then only a memory, I thought I would share my studio space.  My husband would freely tell you that in reality our entire house is my studio, but this is the room that is exclusively mine.  In all truth, this isn't truth.  My space never looks like this except for the unreal staging required of selling a house.  So add piles on tops of bookcases, bins on the floor and an overflowing closet.  That's reality.




Computer station

These photos are also in the aftermath of a major purge.  One of my LYS, String Theory, has a stash sale in late July, and I took advantage.  About a quarter of my books and nearly half my yarn stash went on the block.  I took all my single balls, leftovers, bits and bobs and made fun assortments by color.  I also unloaded my angora since my allergies seem only to be getting worse, and my last attempt to knit with it left me with a day of scratching.  The sale was last weekend, so I will call over
to String Theory tomorrow to see how I did.  Can't wait to see how much I have to spend in store credit - just in time for the Chicago Yarn Crawl!

Reference books - to the
right of computer station

Back to the studio - although the thought of a three digit yarn store credit is sooo dreamy. 




Pattern books and
crochet books

There's very little actual yarn in this room - only pending projects and my stash of recycled cashmere.  The yarn stash resides in plastic bins in the basement.  The purge reduced their number from ten to five.  Smiles from hubby. 

Wall o' storage

With less yarn in the studio, there's no way to hide my multi-craftual nature.  The sewing machine and serger are in plain sight.  Crochet books are in the open.  Needlepoint is on the table, and the jewelry making supplies are in the wall unit.  You can also see my constant companions, Gert and Trudy.  Trudy is the younger me, and Gert the present me.


Needle storage

Here's a shot of my recently reorganized needle collection.  I picked up the stoneware storage pieces at a garage sale and moved them in after a good scrub.  You can't see that the short round container holds my 16" circular needles.

And, last but not least, my inspiration board.  It is composed of four smaller bulletin boards hung together.  It changes frequently as older items come off to make room for the new. 

Inspiration board

In our new house the idea is for me to have a slightly larger studio space to contain more of the multi-crafting activities.  Stay tuned to see how that works out.