The craft room reveal

Okay, you've listened to me talk about working on this for weeks, and I'm finally finished enough to show you my craft room makeover!

First: cover your eyes if you are faint of heart because the "before" photos are rather scary!  Here is what my craft room looked like when the organizational consultant saw it:

 Believe it or not...

...this was already actually a little bit tidied up from its usual chaos.

See?  I'd already begun sorting the fabrics.

And this was the cluttered closet.

TA DA!  Do you see that, down there?  It's the FLOOR!

(In the two bins in front of the desk is my stuff waiting to be listed in my Etsy store for my spring sale!  It's been on hold while I've been cleaning.)

As you can see, I have Container Store "Elfa" shelving in that room, from a re-do several years ago.  I am so ashamed that, even with those drawers to work with, my ephemera, fabric, trims, buttons, etc., could not be contained!

Check out my little sewing desk!  The sewing machine now has its own spot.  That little stool in front of it opens up; it's a 1970s version of a storage ottoman!

Here you get a glimpse of my button collection, improperly but beautifully stored in jars, by color and/or type; on the top shelf, a vintage lampshade frame that I'm going to recover now that I learned how from the Birdsong class, as well as "new" fabric (i.e., not vintage) and some of my lovely vintage and antique tins.  I have to keep stuff like the tins and the pretty glass around for inspiration.

Here, in easy to see-through shoeboxes -- lace for crafting, unsorted buttons, vintage jewelry pieces, and buttons on cards

Here's how I store my loose ribbon - by color, in separate plastic bags

 More buttons (front) - these are the few I have properly carded.  The little cow holding pencils is something my mother kept on our kitchen counter all my life.  The Sky Sox clock is a reminder of summer fun with our local minor league baseball team.

 More buttons, sorted by color, for crafting...I love to use separated dishes for sorting buttons!

Yet more buttons...!

 I do plan to cover these fabrics with a sheet when not in use, to keep the dust off of them.

All of these fabrics are vintage, and they do not include the ones in my collection of "keepers"!

This is my inspiration board, made from an old window.

At the side of this desk -- tons of containers.  The two large pink ones on the floor are full, as are the hat boxes.  The rest of them, including the picnic basket and sewing table drawers, are empty.  I can't decide if I should keep them in this room or not.

More inspiration: including two little turtles Ben made when he was in 2nd or 3rd grade, the dancing flower my husband gave me as a gift on the very first day I met him, and my Jane Austen action figure, among other things!

The plain white storage cabinet on the right of this photo is my new photography area, for taking my shop photos using natural light.  I will store all the props and listing junk, as well as the scale, in there so everything is in one place.  Next to it, the shoe tower that I'm using as another inspiration piece...

I piled it with fun stuff I love (and that I had no place else to put!!)

Here's storage for my vintage wallpaper rolls, and a huge jar that I'm filling with plain white buttons.

Three things I love about my desk: the photo of my son and me when he was about 2-1/2, my tag holder...

...and the only view I have of Pikes Peak from inside my house...see, right there, snowcapped, on the lower left...sorry, not the greatest photo!

Here's the closet, with about 3 carloads less stuff in it!  Most of the stuff stored in the drawers and the shelves in the closet are my "for sale" items in my Etsy store.

This is a dress form that I recovered; I am coveting those of you that have standing dress forms!

Now, here's a peek into a few of my craft room drawers:

 

I still have my newly-sorted ephemera bins to show you, but that will have to be another day as this post has gotten way too long already!

Last but not least: I need to mention that the rest of the clutter from the craft room hasn't quite yet disappeared completely.  I have removed things that need to be put elsewhere or completely gotten rid of, and still have several piles of that to sort through.  

But I am still so happy and proud of what I was able to accomplish in this room -- including putting processes in place, like a bin to store stuff waiting to be listed, and a drawer of unfinished project pieces.  I can hardly wait to do my first project in there!