Sewing 101 with Karen, organizing your sewing area

Are you excited for a new Sewing 101 post?  I know I am!  Welcome February's guest, Karen!

Hi Everyone! My name is Karen from the blog Sew Many Ways...I want to thank Chris for having me here today. Not only do I love to sew, but I also love to organize and repurpose things for different uses. We all have a favorite craft, but if we don't know where all our things are, we could be wasting valuable sewing or crafting time!!
Below are a few (well, not a few...36 to be exact LOL) pictures to help you get a little organized in the area where you sew. Whether you have a big space or the dining room table, maybe a few of these ideas might help!
Use golf tees to keep the matching bobbin on top of the spool of thread. Just hot glue a little silk flower on top to make it pretty.

To help keep that crazy bobbin thread from unraveling, just use a tiny hair scrunchy to wrap around the bobbin. If I can find one to match the color of thread...that's even better.

Traveling to a sewing class or a friends house to sew...keep your thread and bobbin in a recycled cupcake plastic container from the bakery. The cover keeps things all organized and clean.

Keep your thread in different containers. This old tool box not only keeps my thread all in one place...I love the way it looks.

Need a little sewing kit for hand sewing when traveling...plastic soap dish to the rescue!

or how about an eye glass case for a kit too.

What do you get when you cross a pill box with a bobbin...

organizational heaven!

This is a jumbo one.

Do you do a lot of hand sewing or quilting? Does the spool of thread keep disappearing? Well, why not buy an eye bolt from the hardware store and add a necklace to it. You'll never loose your thread again.

Tiny eye bolt for a bobbin of thread.

This is a mason jar pin cushion...they make great gifts for sewing friends.

Handy dandy finger pincushion ring made out of a bottle cap and elastic for the ring.

I used the plastic vial that comes on the end of flowers from the florist to hold pin or needles when I needed to carry them with me for hand sewing or a class.

I bought this tooth brush holder, but the tooth brushes kept slipping out. Now I use it to hold my small scissors next to my machine.

Repurposed mug tree for all my scissors and rotary cutters.

Why not keep all your sewing essentials right where you can find them...ON YOU!! I bought this apron at Home Depot for 79 cents and added the cute fabric to make it my own!

For this idea, I used a cup holder for the car and a fruit can.

I made a little insert to hold all my sewing things when I'm traveling in the car.

Back to the hardware store...big bucket and a tool organizer. Great for sewing, gift wrapping and other craft supplies.

You can also buy an insert for inside too.

You can keep all your fabric underneath inside the bucket and then place the tray on top of it.

I use 2 wooden plate racks on my cutting table to hold all my quilting rulers.

I attached 2 curtain hooks and a curtain rod to the side of my cutting table. This side holds my freezer paper and my Heat and Bond paper.

Add "S" hooks to hold scissor and rulers.

This was a recent Tool Time Tuesday. Tool Time is a feature I have every week to show different ways to use things and think "outside the box". This is a magnetic frame that I made and then used Solo plastic cups with lids to store all my small craft times. I hot glued magnets to the bottom of all the cups. The bookcase holds all my larger craft things.

I keep all the larger items in labeled plastic boxes.

I keep all my patterns in plastic file folders from the office supply store and then store them in a 3 ring binder.

This is an old CD case. I keep all my small plastic and paper templates in here.

These are plastic name badge holders on a key ring. This is great for holding swatches of fabric for a project. Wonderful to take with you to the fabric store to match more fabric.

Here's a great tip when sewing at your machine. Lower your ironing board to your chair level and you won't have to get up for all the quick presses.

Here's a quick tip to fold your fabric. Wrap it around a piece of cardboard that is the depth of the shelf that you store it on.

All the fabric is stored the same way...nice and neat and easy to find.

and last, but not the least. I use a wooden drying rack to keep all the pieces of fabric in order of how I have to sew them...especially important in quilting.

I hope you have enjoyed all the helpful hints to make your sewing life easier. If you want to read more of my organizing tips, you can click here. If you want to see some of my Tool Time Tuesday ideas, you can click here. There are also individual links to all of the above ideas under the "Labels" section of my side bar. Come on over for a visit.

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Thank you again, Chris, for having me here. I can't wait to meet some new friends from your blog!

~Karen~

Thank you, Karen for some fantastic and frugal ways to round up all of our sewing supplies.  I am so excited to try some of these out!  Be sure to visit Karen's blog.  For those of you also new to blogging, she's had a wonderful series called Blog Buddy sharing all kinds of tips and tricks to make blogging understandable and fun.