Decluttering and organizing.
I'm kind of following the Houseworks Organized Christmas Plan - although on a kind of sped-up schedule, because we're planning to sell our house and would therefore like to have it "company-ready" before mid-November. Last week the decluttering assignment was "the craft room", which has really needed a good going-through for years. I've turned up some interesting stuff...
- The curtains I've been meaning to work on for years. Amazingly, all the pieces, including all 24 buttons (which is good, because they need to match another set and I think they're discontinued) were there. I'll actually have them finished by the end of the week; the key to getting that done was to tell my Sewing Neurosis to shut its yap, remind myself that it doesn't matter if the tabs are wrong as long as they're all wrong the same, stop worrying about where I'm a millimeter off straight, and just sew it.
- Felt Santa, a Dimensions beads/sequins/felt wall hanging thing I was working on years ago. Again, almost done - but I don't know if I still have all the pieces. It's possible Dimensions will send me anything I'm missing...
- A cross-stitched bookmark that I'd intended to back with a scrap from the curtains, plus the scrap from the curtains I'd intended to back it with. I'm almost convinced that it's actually ugly and I shouldn't bother finishing it - but I will, anyways.
- A box of afghan squares I've been carrying around for 25 years. About a quarter of them were made by my great-grandmother right before she died; I'd planned to finish it. After I got the rest of the squares made, I realized that, well, it was just ugly (featured colors: hot pink, lemon yellow, neon green...even in 1987, that was pretty much done), and stuffed it all in a box before sewing it together. I gave myself permission to throw it out.
- I also gave myself permission to throw out a worn-out sleeping bag (Hubby wanted me to fix it, but it's not worth it), a worn and stained flannel sheet (it was going to be quilt innards, but I gave up on the quilt), and a few other similar items. The pile of worn-out T-shirts may yet find itself turned into tarn, though.
- I also found, have given myself permission to throw out, but have not yet thrown out: a cookie tin containing about 75 skeins of embroidery floss, also formerly my great-grandmother's. The problem is, they came to me via my chain-smoking great-uncle - the tin has a kind of pretty picture on it, but when I got it, there was so much tobacco residue on it that I thought it was plain gold, and I was absolutely astonished when cleaning it up revealed a scene. Even sealed up inside the tin, the floss picked up a terrible smoke smell, and if anything it's gotten worse over the years, and really, I don't see that the benefit of cleaning it up (a bunch of run-of-the-mill embroidery floss, a lot of it in variegated colors I don't use) is worth the effort. I'm planning to save one or two skeins as a token, and then just dump the tin wholesale; I don't think I'd even give floss that stinky to the thrift store.
- The yarn stash is culled. I'm giving up on the tote of brown acrylic I was thinking of using to make a log cabin blanket; the thrift store is getting that, and a few other things. The whole stash, including spinning fiber, now fits into two big Rubbermaid totes and two small ones, and is entered into my Ravelry stash page. "Must Fit In Existing Stash Totes" seems like a pretty good guideline for future yarn stashing.
- The knitting needle stash is also culled. I officially kept a set of straight needles such that no two pairs are exactly alike (e.g. in size 6, I kept a set of metal 13" straights, a set of plastic 13" straights, and a set of metal 10" straights). The non-interchangeable circulars are sorted and stuck into their hanger. (It turns out I have a lot of size 8 circulars, and no size 9 needles at all. What gives there?) From the leftovers, I pulled out pairs for Daughter; any matched pairs from what was left went into the thrift store bag, and I'm torn about whether the unmatched needles (and I can find mates for a lot of them - it's just that both needles in the pair won't be the same) should be donated or scrapped.
The sad thing is, this only gets me to "mostly done" - there's a couple chairs that have just been shoved into the corner that I need to figure out what to do with, and they're in the way of really finishing the project. Most of what's left seems to be sewing-related - the mending basket (yikes!), a couple small totes of fabric, a lot of stray pattern pieces.
- The curtains I've been meaning to work on for years. Amazingly, all the pieces, including all 24 buttons (which is good, because they need to match another set and I think they're discontinued) were there. I'll actually have them finished by the end of the week; the key to getting that done was to tell my Sewing Neurosis to shut its yap, remind myself that it doesn't matter if the tabs are wrong as long as they're all wrong the same, stop worrying about where I'm a millimeter off straight, and just sew it.
- Felt Santa, a Dimensions beads/sequins/felt wall hanging thing I was working on years ago. Again, almost done - but I don't know if I still have all the pieces. It's possible Dimensions will send me anything I'm missing...
- A cross-stitched bookmark that I'd intended to back with a scrap from the curtains, plus the scrap from the curtains I'd intended to back it with. I'm almost convinced that it's actually ugly and I shouldn't bother finishing it - but I will, anyways.
- A box of afghan squares I've been carrying around for 25 years. About a quarter of them were made by my great-grandmother right before she died; I'd planned to finish it. After I got the rest of the squares made, I realized that, well, it was just ugly (featured colors: hot pink, lemon yellow, neon green...even in 1987, that was pretty much done), and stuffed it all in a box before sewing it together. I gave myself permission to throw it out.
- I also gave myself permission to throw out a worn-out sleeping bag (Hubby wanted me to fix it, but it's not worth it), a worn and stained flannel sheet (it was going to be quilt innards, but I gave up on the quilt), and a few other similar items. The pile of worn-out T-shirts may yet find itself turned into tarn, though.
- I also found, have given myself permission to throw out, but have not yet thrown out: a cookie tin containing about 75 skeins of embroidery floss, also formerly my great-grandmother's. The problem is, they came to me via my chain-smoking great-uncle - the tin has a kind of pretty picture on it, but when I got it, there was so much tobacco residue on it that I thought it was plain gold, and I was absolutely astonished when cleaning it up revealed a scene. Even sealed up inside the tin, the floss picked up a terrible smoke smell, and if anything it's gotten worse over the years, and really, I don't see that the benefit of cleaning it up (a bunch of run-of-the-mill embroidery floss, a lot of it in variegated colors I don't use) is worth the effort. I'm planning to save one or two skeins as a token, and then just dump the tin wholesale; I don't think I'd even give floss that stinky to the thrift store.
- The yarn stash is culled. I'm giving up on the tote of brown acrylic I was thinking of using to make a log cabin blanket; the thrift store is getting that, and a few other things. The whole stash, including spinning fiber, now fits into two big Rubbermaid totes and two small ones, and is entered into my Ravelry stash page. "Must Fit In Existing Stash Totes" seems like a pretty good guideline for future yarn stashing.
- The knitting needle stash is also culled. I officially kept a set of straight needles such that no two pairs are exactly alike (e.g. in size 6, I kept a set of metal 13" straights, a set of plastic 13" straights, and a set of metal 10" straights). The non-interchangeable circulars are sorted and stuck into their hanger. (It turns out I have a lot of size 8 circulars, and no size 9 needles at all. What gives there?) From the leftovers, I pulled out pairs for Daughter; any matched pairs from what was left went into the thrift store bag, and I'm torn about whether the unmatched needles (and I can find mates for a lot of them - it's just that both needles in the pair won't be the same) should be donated or scrapped.
The sad thing is, this only gets me to "mostly done" - there's a couple chairs that have just been shoved into the corner that I need to figure out what to do with, and they're in the way of really finishing the project. Most of what's left seems to be sewing-related - the mending basket (yikes!), a couple small totes of fabric, a lot of stray pattern pieces.