Tuesday 11 August 2015

And Then There Were Two.........

......WIPs that is, as Living with Charm by Lizzie Kate is now complete!

Living with Charm by Lizzie*Kate complete!
 
I haven't added on the charms yet - I'll wait until I finish it properly to do that as I don't want them catching on anything while it's "in storage" lol!  I'm really happy with the way it turned out, even though it wasn't stitched on my preferred fabric (I'm not a fan of Permin/Wichlet linen, I'm a Zweigart girl), but what is a stitcher to do when you win an auction for a metre of it for £6.00 on eBay!  I also ended up with a few full skeins of thread left over, which is never an issue for this stitcher - more to add to the drawers!
 
Speaking of thread drawers, although I feel as though I've talked enough about my storage and threads on the internet - I haven't done it on this platform, so I thought I would show you how I store threads and fabric as stitchers always like to know about that stuff for some reason!
 
Last year I decided it was high time that instead of storing my stitching supplies in various boxes here and there, I would collate my supplies in one place!  I figured as the value of my stitching stash runs quite high (the value not necessarily being what I paid for it:)), it was worth investing in some decent storage that would work for me.  This is what I came up with:
 
 
My Stitching Storage
 
Two custom storage towers from the Really Useful Boxes company which houses my entire fabric and thread collection!
 
The smaller drawers are mainly jam packed full of floss away bags like this:
 
 
A typical thread drawer........
 
 
Or with perles like this:
 

DMC #5 Perle cotton drawer
 
Each of the thread brands has its own drawer or drawers, depending on the amount I have, so for example this is one of my Caron thread drawers:
 
One of my Caron thread drawers
 
There are other supplier specific drawers for Jodyri Designs, GASTs, Dinky Dyes, Gloriana, Thread Pickerz, Mo's Sale and Threadworx etc, as well as some for hand dyed perles, miscellaneous silks and miscellaneous cottons.
 
 As you can see I store all my hand dyed threads in floss away bags - I don't like my special threads getting kinky on bobbins (the same rule does not apply to DMC and Anchor, I'm very devil may care with those!).  I put an index card in each one, so if the thread is for use in a particular project I can make a note on the card and it also gives the bags some strength, making them easier to file in the drawers! 
 

How I Store my Hand Dyed Threads
 
I only begin to kit projects up a few at a time as I come to them, so some threads in my collection are ear marked for different Chatelaines and other special projects.  I just choose to keep my threads as one collection rather than spread across a lot of kitted projects.  Threads that I have used already this year as part of Operation Threadporn are denoted by a little stick on crystal, so as I flick through my drawers looking to pull threads for a project I know which ones I have used already this year (the rule being no duplicate threads allowed this year!).
 
Used threads
 
So that covers the little drawers, but just in case you were wondering what is stored in the others - in the medium drawers you will find my hand dyed fabrics and fat quarter finishing fabrics along with trims and other notions:
 
Some of my hand dyed evenweaves and linens Some of my finishing fabrics

The larger bottom drawers house "The Drawer" (of finishes) along with my plain metres of evenweave and linens and my Anchor (100% complete) and DMC (90% complete) cotton collection (all bobbinated in boxes):
Metres of plain evenweaves and linens
Bobbinated DMCs and Anchors

So there you have it - a sneak peek into my stash!

Happy Stitching!

17 comments:

  1. Awesome! Congrats on the finish and thank you for sharing your storage system. Someday I'll get that organized.

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  2. Lovely finish! I wish my stash was as organized.

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  3. Another beautiful finish, Amanda! And wow, you are so organized!! Love love love it! I've often wondered myself why we take such an interest in others "stuff." To get tips and hints? to inspire? Straight out curiosity!

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  4. Your storage system is so impressive! I'm one who has my stash scattered amongst three rooms. Just no one good place to organize everything...

    Your finish is so pretty!

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  5. Great stash I love the colored boxes!

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  6. Oh wow - I just love your organisation system. Even the drawers are a pretty colour! And your stash is wonderful - I am completely swooning :)

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  7. Congrats on your finish, it's lovely! What an awesome way to store your stash! Do you have room to expand still as it grows or will you have to get another tower at some point? :-)

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    1. There is a little bit of room, but to be honest I don't see my stash growing much more :). There are two thread brands that I will expand my collection of next year - but other than that I pretty much have every colour of silk, cotton and perle covered in there somewhere!

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  8. oh, those rainbow towers are my favourite, so bright and cheerful!
    I didn't realise the bottom drawers were bigger, and I was wondering how you managed to keep track of what you used already for Operation Threadporn.. 😉
    I must say the prettiest thing are the finishes on top of the drawers, what a lovely display!
    congratulations on the L*K finish, looks like a lot of fun! I had a feeling this would be the next one to get finished 😊

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  9. Love the rainbow towers! I have a rainbow tower of my own that I use for fabrics and finished unfinishes. I am trying to get a rainbow of colors for the floss boxes but they seem impossible to find now! Definitely love the fabric drawers the most haha. Those hand-dyes look delicious! Your flossaway storage is great too. I use bobbins 'cause the little kinks never bother me unless it's a really stiff floss (metalics). Where do you keep your patterns? :D

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  10. Congrats on your finish and your storage system is great! Very organized!

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  11. WOW! Look at that stash!! That's amazing. Congrats on the finish, it looks fantastic! :D

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  12. congrats on a beautiful finish. Great storage system and beautiful stash ♥♥♥

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  13. Another gorgeous finish! I love seeing all your little pillows and finishes on top of the rainbow boxes.

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  14. Congratulations on your finish - both it & your stash organization look lovely. I love organizing & organizational tools, so I also enjoy seeing how other people keep their stuff & stash. Thanks for sharing!

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  15. This storage tower is awesome, just awesome. I have to be on the lookout for something similar because I doubt if it would be possible to get such a multi-coloured one here in my region. Your threads and fabrics organization certainly took a while but it looks great now. BTW, I'm a Zweigart girl too and prefer their fabrics to anything else.

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  16. I love your Lizzie Kate finish!! One of my favorite Lizzie Kate patterns:) And your storage is awesome!! I have some serious storage envy right now ;)

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