There's a reason for my absence of late. This is the summer of the Big Cleanout! I've been going through every cupboard, closet, and shelf in the house and clearing away all the stuff we no longer need or want. It's been a huge process. When we moved here 4 years ago we moved from a neighborhood where garage sales were not allowed. We also moved to a bigger house with lots of storage space. So, everything got moved right in without being so much considered. Also, there were lots of children's items I wasn't ready to get rid of. I am feeling less sentimental these days and so lots of toys are being sold or given away.
The other big project has been the clean out in my studio. I have the regular closet you can see in the first photo and behind that is a secret closet. I took out everything and sorted, organized and purged and then started to put it all away. I went through every bit of fabric to sort and re-fold to a standard size that you can see above. In the meantime my studio has been such a gigantic mess that I couldn't even think about being creative. It's been weeks since I've done any kind of creative work in my studio.
I'm happy to say that I have made great progress and everything is much tidier now. It pleases me to have a clean slate to work from. There will still be less sewing this summer as I have many other things going on, but at least I can feel a sense of calm when I walk in the room.
The prints and specialty fabrics are all stored in the closet in these bins. I am using these fabrics less and less, but they are organized by type so it shouldn't be hard to find what I need. The solids are stored in the armoire and are the easiest to get to since they are my go-to fabrics.
The other side of the room got my attention yesterday. Hurray!
In other news, I have had some disappointment in my quilt submissions lately. I entered two quilts in the IQF Primitive and Folk Art category for Houston that didn't get in. Today I found out that my two entries for the Quilt! Knit! Stitch! Black to White challenge were not accepted. That's a bummer, but I'm happy that those two submissions at least did not cost any money. The advantage to submitting to IQF contests is that there is no entry fee. Right now I have 4 other contest submissions pending. I'll let you know how that stacks up as I find out.