Sew Crafty

I spent the last week sorting, organizing and prepping for packing all my sewing and craft stuff--and shopping for more. The reason I brought nearly my whole hoard of sewing and craft materials with me in the first place wasn't just because I couldn't decide which projects I wanted to work on, it was to do just this where I could spread out as well as get my Mom's and/or sister's help with a variety of things preventing me from proceeding on this or that project.

The top picture is showing just part of my yarn--the part still in skeins. I lifted out the two bags of remnants setting on top hoping to get a pretty shot to grace the top of a post. I'm thinking it will make a fun jigsaw puzzle too--for the game on my computer that will take any image you feed it and turn it into a puzzle with anywhere from 6 to 1200 piece.

The yarn was all collected for intended needlepoint projects but now that I'm getting back into crochet....

Pictured here is the current state of my crochet thread supply including those added from my trips to Jo-Anne's Fabric on Saturday and Micheal's on Tuesday and the two spools from my original collection I emptied making bookmarks while here.


The state of my ribbon collection after the visit to Jo-Anne's Fabric Saturday. I added several more Tuesday. None of these came with me from home. My cousin bought me half a dozen in April when she took me shopping to get one for the first bookmark I was mailing to my MIL for her birthday. My sister bought me one she came across in a discount bin a couple weeks ago and I found several partials in my Mom's craft drawer.


The current state of my bead collection. Only the bag top left came with me from home. The other two on the top row came from Jo-Anne's and the whole bottop row came from my Mom's craft drawer.

These are the same beads in the middle bag top row in the picture above it. I emptied them into a tray trying for another picture with potential to carry a post. Also to do display the colors and the variety of shpaes and sizes. I have yet to find duplicate in the mix. See yesterday's post featuring the bookmarks for an idea how I intend to use them.



Here we see the result of the sorting and organizing. It's a mix of what came with me and things added while here from shopping and rummaging in my Mom's remnants. Below we see those same bags packed for travel but in such a way I can easily access the things I'm still likely to need.



The oversized gift bag that has been my sewing sack for the last five or six years got ripped in transit last December and I've been fretting how I was going to pack the things once in it for the return trip. Especially my cross stitch projects which are in a plastic bag with a zipper but no handles--the kind linnes come in--and which I don't want to have punctured. This bag was in with my craft stuff awaiting transformation into a Xmas or birthday gift with the addition of some stitches, beads, buttons or paint. I suppose by using it this way I can't make it into a gift now.


This was my haul from Michael's Tuesday. Blue, green, and purple crochet thred, five rolls of ribbon, a seam ripper, a knit picker, a sheet of inspirational stickers and a set of pendents for a book mark. I already had a seam ripper but was frustrated to keep discovering I'd left it with a different project when I needed it. So what do I do the following day? I use my old seam ripper to pull a staple from packaging material and broke off its tip. *sigh*

The pendents are too hard to see here so I cropped them out and fiddled with brightness, contrast and color....


They were on a clearance rack and there was only the one or I might have bought at least two because I would like to make one for myself as well as one to give away. It will be hard to choose which way to go but I'm currently leaning toward making it for myself even tho I've got a zillion bookmarks already.


Here's some of my haul from Jo-Anne's. The beads are the same ones featured above. There are two needle threaders--I've already got several but all are attached to projects except the one atatched to my portable sewing kit.

My portable sewing kit was once a project from a kit for a needlepoint key fob. The pattern designated the word 'keys' and I changed the first and second letter for obvious reasons. It has a felt back on which are stored a couple dozen tapestry and crewel needles and straight pins.


Now comes the biggest splurge of my craft shopping this past week and also the one thing that will make continuing to work on my crafts once I get back home way more likely.

It's an Omnigrid.

From the outside it looks like a notebook and is near the size of a sheet of typing paper. It opens like a notebook too:


But it is so not a notebook. The left panel is a matte for cutting with a measuring grid. The right panel is a pad with the same surface as an ironing board cover for that is what it's for. It is apparently designed for quilters and is a perfect size for working with single quilt blocks. But I immediately saw its usefulness for my bookmark and book cover projects with all their small pieces that get rumpled in their bags and drawers not to mention all those remnants from Mom's sewing that I've claimed--ribbon, bias tape, seam backing (which looks a lot like ribbon) and ric rac.

Even as I squirreled the stuff from Mom away in my own hoard, I wondered how likely I was to use it once I got it home seeing how hard it was to get out my MIL's iron and ironing board and get it set up where I have the light I need to use it. Her iron is in a cupboard I can't reach and the only places with room to set up the board are her room and the kitchen.

But problem solved now.

It was the first thing I came across upon entering Jo-Anne's Saturday and it's pre-discount price represented half my entire budget for the two craft store trips but I put it in my basket anyway, saying to my sister, "Now all I need is a miniature iron. I was joking because I had no idea they actually made such a thing but not ten minutes later my sister found me at a bead display to show me one.


I just love it and can't get over how cute it is.