More scraproom/studio pics...

Well my craft room/studio/lounge. call it what you will, is certainly coming along... I've already posted some pics on Facebook but I know I have friends and family who are not on FB so thought I'd better include them here!

 

Shelving on the right-hand side was completed first, the lower shelves are custom-cut to fit the gap between the doorframe and the wall, just that bit too thin for an Expedit, so I have my own version... The top shelves are IKEA 'Billy' bookshelves, the middle one has been slimmed down to fit so the shelves look uniform next to the desk.

 

The left-hand end now complete too, two more Billy bookcases that have been altered to fit the remaining gap but not to obscure the window too much, and also accommodate my printer. The white drawer set is staying... for now...

 

...but I now have a customised filing cabinet, the top drawer of which now takes 12x12 handing files. Initially I bought a pack of five 12x12 files but that cost me nearly £9 - so instead I made 17 of my own from some old foolscap and A4 hanging files and a roll of parcel tape - they'll do the trick nicely!

 

 

And to round things off for now, this rather spiffy washi-tape holder was made for me by my best mates Debbie's Dad - from offcuts and bits of 1/4" dowel - and my entire collection of washi-tape fits perfectly - all 92 reels of it...

 

Does this mean that I now can't buy any more washi-tape because it won't fit in the rack?

 

Does it heck... he made me two... :-) Thanks Dave xx

Craftroom re-modelling continues...

You may recall from my previous post that I had to clear my craft desk so that my friend Tim could re-site it at a better height - and intended doing it whilst I was away so that I "didn't get under his feet"...

Well, I arrived back in Southend on Thursday evening, after a knackering coach trip and then driving back round the M25 after dropping my sister home - staggered up my stairs with my bags and stopped dead... for at the top of the stairs was the bottom half of the Ikea Billy bookcase...

I thought Tim's plan was just to get the desk to the correct height, but no... he went all out and totally replaced the desk so that it is a huge 'L' shape running under the window and under the bookcase - which is going to be re-sited a little higher up the wall to give me clear working space underneath it!

The bookshelf is currently sitting on the desk but once it is moved (and probably shortened a bit more) there will be a massive desk area for me to spread out on - heaven!

Under the desk on the left he has built a little cubby which as well as providing support for the desk top, will house a built-in purpose cupboard for my scrapbooking papers/cardstock - we're in discussion as to how exactly this will work but he has a "cunning plan" so I'm leaving him to it... I did suggest however that the bottom half of the bookcase could well slide under the desk flat against the wall and provide more storage space for my Really Useful Boxes (that seem to be multiplying at an alarming rate)... there will still be more than enough legroom under the desk so no worries there.

Not sure yet whether the black drawer unit is staying or being replaced - but right now it's happy there. The other two white units are being replaced at some stage too.

He has made a great start but is not finished by a long shot - but life (and weather) gets in the way - we've had seriously bad flooding in Southend today and roads have been closed, so he took the opportunity to work on something else, but will be back in due course to carry on the re-model.

And I can't wait to get crafting on it!

Slightly less over-whelmed...

I've now made serious inroads into tidying and boxing up my craft stuff ahead of the first stage in re-modelling my lounge into a lounge-cum-craft studio - still have a ways to go but thought I'd share what I have done so far.

ALL the carrier bags that were under the table and around the chair have been emptied and the contents found proper homes for - now I can get under the desk and start to pull out the tools and odds and sods that have migrated under there. The sewing machine (which is a 1952-ish handcranked jobbie) is going to a friend from Benfleet Scrappers, so that'll release some more space.

I've made a good start at clearing the desk itself, some things have been put away where they should have been put away well before now *looks all sheepish and hangs head guiltily* but other things have had to go into storage boxes for now, until I can find proper homes for them. I've also earmarked a lot of stuff to either sell, move on, recycle or (shock horror) purely throw away as it's no use to man nor beast - or even other crafters! I know that "One mans trash is another mans treasure" - but seriously peeps... there is a limit here, and some things have just reached it!

To help with storage I've bought some rather lovely sturdy but collapsible storage boxes from The Works - they were a fiver each but well worth it as they look lovely - I've got 2 of each design, London and Paris, as well as a 5th one which has the London Underground map printed on it. They are a good size, they take a 12x12 ziplock baggie laying down nicely, so all the baggies of half-finished and "yet-to-start" layout projects I've had laying around can go in one, all the kits bought from Total Papercrafts etc can go in another etc... As you can see this is definitely a work in progress, piles of stuff moved away from the craft desk just so's I can get near it to clear it, but it will all sort itself out eventually.

The plan is for these nice storage boxes to go under the shelf that the DVD/video player is on - currently under there are several carrier bags containing holiday ephemera - y'know, all the "crap" you bring back from your holidays that you want to use in scrapbook albums for that holiday: brochures, ticket stubs, newspapers, postcards etc... they are all piled up and sliding around looking messy. So if I put the bags into a couple of these smart storage boxes instead it'll look much neater. And with a luggage label tied to the handle of each one (thanks for that great idea Toni!) I can easily locate which box has got what in it.

But that is phase 2 - or even possibly phase 3 - clearing the top of the craft desk so that it can be removed and re-sited takes priority, and I only have a few days left to do this.

So I'd better hop to it!

Totally overwhelmed...

Ever felt so totally overwhelmed that you just don't know where to begin? how to start? how to even make a plan of action?

Let me introduce you to my lounge-cum-craftroom - living alone I can get away with spreading out a little and letting my hobby kinda take over a corner of the lounge... but its gotten rather out of hand.


This is my desk - my fella and I custom-built it a few years back, to fit perfectly between the window and an existing bookcase which couldn't be moved. Trouble is, we got a little carried away with our measurements and mis-read the marks we'd made on the wall, consequently the desk is about 2 inches too high to sit at comfortably. So I sourced an office chair and a footrest from Freecycle and with the chair at its highest point and my feet on the footrest it seemed to work... but not really totally suitable... but it seemed too much effort to take everything off the desk and re-site it, especially as the little cubby on the right of the picture houses my modem, and I need to be able to get my hand in there to re-set it...

So, altho the desk got used quite a bit, it also became a bit of an "administrative dumping ground" and it got to the stage where I needed to set up a folding camping table to be able to work... trouble is, it's only a small table and very soon it because rather full. (Having said that, the only reason the project life box and ink pads, as well as the pile of envelopes are on there, is because I had to move them to get to the modem when my internet went down earlier - honest!)

The camping table has the opposite problem to the desk, in that its a little too low and I can't quite get my knees under it... might have something to do with the pile of pizza boxes stacked up under it containing half of my cardstock and paper stash...

So my friend Tim (who I swear closes his eyes and shudders each time he comes into my lounge) has decided to take matters into his own hands and re-site my desk to the correct height - and last night we were discussing the best way to utilise my lounge as a craft room - he's suggesting cutting this Ikea Billy bookcase in half and mounting it a bit higher on the wall, and then extending the desk to go across underneath it as well as making it considerably deeper - the bottom 2 shelves of the Billy house photo albums which can be re-homed elsewhere so that's not a problem.

The pizza boxes will have to go somewhere, so he's turned himself 90 degrees to the right and looked at the wall of mis-matched shelves and units... and decreed that they will all come out and he'll put two custom-built shelves which will be deep enough to take my growing collection of thin 12x12 plastic boxes (y'know, the ones you get at Ally Pally 3 for £10...) as well as everything else currently there...

I have 3 more bookshelves in the lounge currently behind the sofa, and they will also be cut in half and mounted above these new shelves to form purpose-built storage - utilising what I already have to its best advantage.

Trouble is, there's currently an awful lot of stuff on these shelves and units - in fact there's an awful lot of stuff everywhere - he wants to start by lowering my current desk whilst I'm away on me hols in a few weeks time, which means I have to clear the top of the desk, and everything that's precariously balanced on the chair, as well as moving the "carrier bag holding pen" that's sprung up underneath the chair and into the corner under the desk (where the woefully inadequate powerpoints are)... so you can see why I have a problem - and why I'm so overwhelmed!

Suggestions please - however the first person to recommend a skip (or a number of skips) gets royally slapped...