Organizing your crafts for the perpetually disorganized

January, the fresh start, the new year, the time of getting your… stuff together. Because of a leak in our basement, I have been re-doing my sewing and crafts area. I have a tendency to let things go for a long time, then frantically try to dig myself out when it gets too much. Things that get put down “for a minute” tend to stay permanently. Especially with craft materials, which are all about creative use, everything might be useful for something even if I don’t have a plan for it. It is hard to get rid of things. So, I look to help from books and websites to tell me how to make a working, organized work area.

Books:

Organizing From the Inside Out by Erin Morgenstern
The Hoarder in You by Dr. Robin Zasio
Organizing Solutions for Every Quilter by Carolyn Woods

Julie Morgenstern’s book applies to all kinds of clutter and organizational issues, and she’s written some other excellent books on time management and dealing with your stuff. Dr. Zasio is a consultant for the show Hoarders. I haven’t finished her book yet, but she talks about the psychological reasons behind hoarding. She explains that there is a continuum, a range going from excessively neat to clinical definitions of hoarding. Clinical definitions of hoarding are when it interferes with the day to day functioning of your life, but many of us are “clutterers with hoarding tendencies”. She not only discusses how to help yourself, but how to approach a friend or loved one you want to help. She talks about the type of clutter you have- sentimental, potentially useful, not wanting to be wasteful, stockpiling in case of emergency, and overwhelmed. Carolyn’s book on organizing quilting has some similarities to Morgenstern’s book, in that she talks about having “stations”, while Morgenstern talks about “zones”. In both, the idea is to have everything you need to do an activity in one area, in a way that makes sense to you and is easy to maintain. So I started pulling out stuff that had nothing to do with the activity I want to do in this area. I used to do scrapbooking, but haven’t touched the stuff in about five years. That can either go somewhere else or be donated.

Another resource for planning your craft space is Pinterest– several pinners have made boards for designing their craft space, with links to things like how to fold cloth, innovative storage ideas, how to make layered shelves, and of course, the inevitable million dollar dream craft room to envy.