Kids, Kitties, and More

The new year started off with a real bang. First, our family grew by three kittens. Unfortunately, they were infected with ringworm, which they so lovingly shared with us. Tubes and tubes of medication later, and everyone is finally healthy.

As for work on the house, not a whole lot has been happening. We continue to move forward ever slowly. Some of our seeds are started in hopes of an early spring and I spent the past three weeks organizing my sewing room. This is my room - my sanctuary. But it also has to contain a lot more than just my sewing. Over the holidays, my mother was kind enough to gift me with this wonderful hand quilting frame. Of course, it is very large and measures about ten feet long. In other words, that means that there is literally only one wall that I can place it near.

This gift kind of caused the organizing bug to bite me big time. Then my mother shared a YouTube video with me created by Creative Organizer that shows how to organize and fold your fabrics. This really got me going. My OCD was officially in high gear. I'll try to explain each picture below for those that are interested. If organizing really bores you, feel free to skip this post!

 

The first step was finding all of my quilting and sewing fabrics. In an effort to clean up the sewing room so that we could sand the original wood floors, I had boxed and boxed everything I had. Most of this was stored in the basement; other boxes wherever I could fit them. The upper cabinet of this closet now provides much needed storage for my quilt batting, bolts of white muslin and backing fabric. The lower closet originally came with the three uppermost shelves and the brackets on the inside of each door.

I hung a lap quilt made from a panel that my mom gave to me on the left-side closet door; the right side holds my hand quilting hoop and the pedals for two of my sewing machines. I saved the clear vinyl plastic bags that some curtains were in and found that these were great for corralling the foot pedals and power cords. As for the fabrics, the top shelf holds all of my flannels. I like to use flannel when backing smaller projects, like simple little wall hangings. The next shelf holds my fabrics that consist of pieces too long to even be able to fold in half! These work great for backing larger projects. The bottom shelf holds a few miscellaneous projects and some completed piecework. I did use a small rubbermaid tub to hold all the panel pieces and their coordinating fabrics. I was surprised by how many of them I had to work with! Finally, on the floor are the extension tables for two of my sewing machines. I use these when machine quilting.

I originally tried to organize all my fabrics in the nine-cube storage shelves (see next picture), but quickly learned that I had way more fabric then space. Thankfully, the baker's rack was available and able to be repurposed now that pantry is done. The bright pink gift bag is holding a special project that I am currently working on with my mom. The two little drawers contain quilting tools and special project items (pins, alligator clips, etc.). I hung little tags so that I would know what was in each drawer! The shelves hold specifically colored fabrics that were too numerous for a cube. The little picnic basket on the floor by the closet door holds all of my fabric that features food. It just cracked me up and made me so happy every time I came across a fabric with some type of food on it!

Moving on around the room, we see the nine-cube storage shelves. This holds my smaller quantity fabrics or are organized by those fabrics that did not really fit into one color category. I have a boys' novelty pile; a girls' novelty pile; a gender neutral pile; a rainbow pile; a patriot pile, and so on. I am also able to use the top to store an extra sewing machine as well as various bits of binding, buttons, and lace in the mason jars. Finally, the little magazine rack holds my finished quilt tops waiting to be mounted on the quilt frame.

The hand quilting frame is tall enough that I am able to store the repurposed bins underneath without them interfering with my hand quilting. One bin holds my papers for card making and scrapbooking; another holds my stamps and stamping tools and accessories; all my cross-stitch fabrics are stored in yet another bin; and so are my scraps from various quilting and sewing projects. There is one bin that is a bit odd - the homeschool curriculum bin. Since this is my room and we use a lot of the stamping and scrapbooking supplies for making various school projects, it just made sense to keep it all together and protected in "my space". Finally, behind the bins is a huge rolling tackle box that I use to store all my embroidery floss (in numerical order and numbered). On the wall behind the frame are a bunch of randomly hung nails specifically for hanging templates and rulers.

Here is my primary working area. My favorite sewing machine is the one directly in front on the little sewing table. In the drawer of the sewing table I keep important manuals for the sewing machines and the exchangeable quilt hanging frame decorative tops. The dresser to the right has three drawers; the top one holds my sewing tools and the bottom two drawers hold pieces of fabric that are too small for the other fabric piles but too big for the scrap bin. On top I have placed my cutting board and in more mason jars I have placed various crafting tools: general scissors, specialty scissors, paintbrushes and markers, and chalk. As you can see from the labeler, it is kept handy just for labeling everything in sight! Finally, the treadle sewing  machine is stored in its cabinet and the primary secondary sewing machine sits on top so that I can quickly and easily switch between the two machines.

Sometimes I just need an extra set of hands or lap. I love this little rolling cart. I usually store it between the dresser and the closet when I don't need it. I use this to store my threads in the top drawer and projects in progress in the bottom two drawers. When I am working on a hand quilting project, the top is a great place to set my spool of thread, pin cushion, scissors, thimbles, grips and more. (In the first picture up top that shows the quilting frame you can see all the stuff I throw on top of this when quilting!)

 

 

This is the matching closet to the first one that I showed at the top of this post. The upper cabinet here holds fabric for clothes, opposed to ones that I would use for quilting. The shelf holds a few scrapbook albums and some totes with cross-stitch patterns, lace trimmings, rick rack, and notions. I also have a small, portable tackle box with general, commonly used embroidery floss for projects "on the go". Finally, I used a divided lunch container to hold my glue gun and sticks. My ironing board folds up and fits in the blank space that you see above. If it should happen to fall, the closet rod catches it, preventing it from falling completely. My husband also added another shelf to the bottom of this closet, perfect for holding a box of sewing notions (elastic and zippers) as well as some mason jars with additional sewing trimmings and my two irons.

Between the two closets is a charming little window seat with three "sections". On the left side is a little cupboard that is perfect for holding my various three-ring binders that I use to organize various things. In the middle is a large storage area, with a lid that lifts up. Inside here I have stored our games. I am hoping that this will prevent us from losing any more pieces! On the right side is a small file drawer. This is the perfect place to store my patterns and specialty stitch cards for my sewing machine. I tried to dress this area up a bit to make it warm and comfortable.

 

 

I saw this wonderful idea on Pinterest - using tea cups for tie backs. I was struggling with hanging mine, but then my husband suggested industrial strength velcro. And it worked beautifully! Next to the folded fabric, this gives me a tickle of pleasure.

Finally, I begged my husband to build me a bookshelf for above the window seat that would be strong enough to hold my various quilting, sewing and decorating books. Understanding my concern about how heavy these could be, he repurposed two bi-fold doors. Using the window trim and two additional brackets in addition to quite a few screws, safely secured this for me! Of course, the little baskets up there are holding some more quilting projects too!

I know that these individual photos can make it challenging to get a true feel for the room, so my last picture for today is a more full picture photo from the door. I really love my space and find myself going in there for a little bit every chance I get. Now, just to get the rest of the house in order! Maybe then I won't feel so lost in all the remodeling!

Getting Our Heat On

One of the side effects of taking down walls is that you end up with these new, fun, but no so cool, hanging decorations.

In the front, is the electric box that controls the kitchen and dining room lights. These have to be rerouted and are on our never ending list of projects and things to do. More importantly, though, the thermostat is just hanging around on the left side of the chimney. This was the perfect height for little fingers and resulted in a few adjustments. One night we all woke up freezing because someone turned the furnace off! Other nights, the fan ran all night long....again, because someone turned it from auto to fan. Of course, whenever Mommy or Daddy asks, we are told it was "not me". Apparently, we have a child running around that we have not personally met yet named Not Me!

Anyway, Daddy took a few moments and with the help of the little man, reran the thermostat wires so that it could be relocated to its new home, just around the corner and in the living room.

It actually moved about three feet from its original location, and since we want to put in a wood stove some day, hopefully, it will no longer be needed as much. Don't worry, little fingers have trouble reaching it now, since we have a coffee table blocking direct access except for the taller members of the family! Yeah....one more thing improved! See, we are starting to make progress!

To See or Not To See

We decided to start working upstairs after all. First stop, the girls' bedroom. When we moved into the house, we noticed an odd little access panel in an alcove shaped area of the bedroom. At the time,we were not sure what the layout of the house was, but we were too busy moving in and getting settled to do much exploring.

The alcove is located opposite the window. It was obviously going around some obstruction, but was the perfect space to put one of the dressers, until it was eventually relocated and replaced with a crib.

Here is what the alcove looks like mid renovation. As you can see, it was hiding a body! Not really, that's just my wonderful husband checking things out. Apparently, the alcove was made to go around the chimney. The method for doing this was to screw this really, really cheap plywood up and then glue, yes glue, the drywall to the plywood.  It took us a few hours, but in short order, we had it all cleaned up and looking good.

I am sure many of you looking at this picture must think that we are crazy to open up the alcove area the way we did. We can understand that, except for one thing....it was never meant to be closed off like it was! How do we know? Once again, we have found original wood flooring and baseboards behind the alcove wall!

I have no idea what this space could possibly have been used for originally. Do any of you dear readers have any suggestions? Or seen anything like this before? We are actually thinking of opening it up on the opposite side into the master bedroom and turning it into a built in bookcase, since I love to read so much. But we are not sure yet. Do you have any ideas?

Of course, cleaning up the chimney upstairs made us reconsider the chimney in the kitchen. When we last worked on the chimney, we thought we were "finished" with this look...

Obviously, the plaster would need to be cleaned up and the old adhesive removed. Since it was obviously originally plastered, based on the remaining chair rail and base board pieces, we thought we would simply clean it up and leave only the dining room facing part of the chimney exposed. However, since I loved the look of the chimney upstairs so much, out came the hammer and chisel...

With the chimney exposed this way, our house is really starting to look kind of "lofty" - exposed brick, beams, and wood floors. One thing that really surprised us was discovering the original stove pipe still in the chimney.

Unfortunately, the chimney is currently being used to vent the hot water heater and the furnace. We were pleasantly surprised to see that the venting was going up through a metal conduit (which you can just barely see on the left side of the hole), but we were still concerned about any fumes that might escape. We didn't have time to order a proper stove pipe covering, so we decided to improvise.

The trick was trying to figure out how to affix our improvised covering. Using Gorilla Glue, a piece of scrap wood, and my husband's trusty Little Giant Ladder, we had something that would work at least long enough for the glue to dry. We left it this way all night. Of course, we had some trouble keeping the little one off the ladder!

This morning, I was finally able to take the picture of our improvised stove pipe cover. Originally, I was planning on painting the kitchen red and decorating with vintage coffee cans, mills, and advertisements. Now, I think we will go with a sage green, similar to what was on the plaster, but decorate with watering cans instead.

I really love the finished look! The green in the plate is a good match to what we took down and I like the kind of vintage look of the watering can. This plate was part of a mixed set that my mom had given to us last summer when she was moving. (Thanks Mom!) I am finally feeling as though we are actually making some progress and actually making improvements!