Organized Chaos?

I've been slowly getting my office/sewing studio in order. I have quite a bit left to do, but at least I've begun. Baby steps. Here is one corner of my room that has 2 black bookshelves. The bookshelf on the left has some of my sewing patterns. I wouldn't have chosen purple and pink containers, but they were on sale (under $1.50/each) several years ago at Target. They are actually trash cans made out of thick plastic with metal trim. I would prefer to have all the same color (maybe the wall color), but I haven't run across a reasonably (ok, cheap) priced solution yet. What would be totally awesome is those 5 across, 5 down cubbie shelves from Ikea, but now I'm totally dreaming! My cross stitch thread is stored on the bottom shelf in those handy, dandy plastic divided boxes. The black shelf on the right holds reference books, quilting mags, sewing mags, and scrapbooking mags. The bottom shelf is a few card-making supplies. Those will probably be moved as this organized chaos is tamed. The small purple crates were bought at Walmart a couple of weeks ago ($1.50/each). They are a good size for the small bits of fabric. Don't be fooled. Most of that is not fat quarters, but smaller pieces. Our Boston Terrier, Lucy, seems to think I folded all that and placed it there for her to pull out again and again and again! Grrr!

Next to the shelves and crates is my pegboard (a leftover piece that DH put in frame I had from a recycled piece we salvaged and painted some time ago. Since taking this photo a few days ago, it has been tweaked again! However, the main change is the 2 baskets of tulle have been moved, and in their place will be 2 more small crates to hold the patterns that Lucy keeps pulling off the lower shelves!

She's a plastic freak, and of course, just about all my storage is plastic. By moving the patterns to the pegboard, they are beyond her reach, thank goodness! All the fabric in the wire bins (purchased at Gordman's last fall) is from yard sales, estate sales, leftovers from projects, and inherited stash.


I haven't bought hardly any new fabric in years. I need to use up some of this so I can justify buying some new stash. The white shelves formerly were in DS/12's nursery. On the left is the white plastic basket that the dog kept pulling off and running away with. That spot will be for something else (not sure what yet.) Next to that are some larger pieces of fabric (from an estate sale). On the bottom left, the brown basket thing is a 3-drawer unit I bought a year ago at a yard sale for $2. It holds scrapbooking supplies. Next to that is a couple of photo boxes and my big bite, crop-a-dile II. On the right side is more scrapbooking supplies and photo boxes. Once everything is in a more organized state, I'll give a better tour, but you really don't want to see the rest of the room yet. Trust me.... it looks like this....

The rest of the room is one hot mess, I know. Photo sorting is years behind in my house. Hope to have this under control soon. I have made progress, but there so much more to sift through.

Changing gears....DS/12 had 2 teeth pulled and was quite the trooper. He had a good nurse too!
See?