I was floundering a little this morning wondering where I should start … after going back and forth for a while, I decided to take a deep breath and just start anywhere! I chose to start in my guest room closet and it’s done! Keith has a bunch of things now waiting for him to donate and what’s left is ready to be loaded on the truck except for a couple partially filled bins that I’ll add to from other rooms.
I came across a couple of bins that were packed up in Minneapolis in 2014 … and never unpacked. They went first to Big Canoe and then came here in 2018 when we sold the condo. You’d think everything in those bins could be discarded but nope. There were some important things in them that I’ll keep, some things will get donated, and some things got tossed. Kind of like how it will go in the rest of the house.
Second up was another closet – this one in my sewing room and that one is almost finished too. I’ve just got two small bins to go through and it’s done (but there are 4 other closets in that room!). I was very happy to find my old computer back up CDs in this closet. During our move from Minnesota the photo album of the quilts made during my first 5 years was lost. I just had to take a look at one of the CDs and I found some great family photos I hadn’t seen in a while AND quilts from my first year of quilting 2000 – 2001.
We were living in a townhouse in Pembroke Pines FL in 2000 when I caught the quilting bug. I started sewing at our dining room table … you can see I put some bins in the corner and have stuff everywhere. This was back when I had to actually clean up and put things away at the end of every sewing day! Don’t I look young? Hard to believe that was just 21 years ago.
It didn’t take long for me to take over part of the small family room where Keith had his office and where my computer desk was … you can see I was running out of space on the bookcase. I had also upgraded the Singer sewing machine I’d bought at Walmart to the Elna that I still sew on.
So, I just got another bookcase!
The move from Pembroke Pines FL to Marietta GA was the easiest one from a quilting standpoint. That was my entire stash on those two bookshelves and I hadn’t bought the longarm yet.
I’ll be working on a few Log Cabin Heart blocks this week here and there but since there won’t be much current quilting content, I’ll continue to share some of my older pre-blog quilts from the back up CDs. I just have to make sure that I don’t let myself get TOO distracted looking at old photos.
I started my first quilt in 2003 with a group from the local Baptist Church, where my friend was leading the group. They were short one participant. All cutting was done using templates, and the sewing was by hand. it didn’t take me long to realize that this could be accomplished by machine, and while I finished hand sewing and hand quilting the queen size quilt from the class, I fell in love with making blocks by machine, and my life was changed forever, I do not make heirloom quilts, just pieces of love to keep a body warm.
Love this scrapbook look at your early quilting spaces. This would inspire beginners who think they don’t have room to make a quilt. All the huge quilting spaces online can defeat a dream.
Looking at photos can be your reward for a good day’s work. :o))
Brown hair or auburn, Mary???
Oh I love this!!! Your slow and subtle take over of the house! ha ha!!! What fun memories!!
We all have to start somewhere with sewing spaces and stash. I wish that I actually had photos of my early sewing spaces. I sewed garments at my desk in my college dorm room, and then at a dining room table in my first off-campus apartment. After getting married in ’77, that sewing machine lived in my dining room again in Iowa. After moving to my husband’s childhood house on the farm we had a huge living room and I sewed at an old desk in one corner, with a similar bookcase and a couple of tubs of supplies and fabric. That is where I started quilting in the early ’80s. With a couple of moves over the years, my quilting space (no more garments) has moved from dining room tables to living room corners, and finally to spare bedrooms as my kids left home. Those little spaces never seemed to limit the creativity however. And my stash has just gradually taken over as my spaces got bigger – and had doors I could close to hide it. LOL Thanks for pushing me into walking down memory lane.
Love the memory lane pics, Mary. The younger you, the smaller quilting space. We have all changed over the years. Happy memories.
Isn’t it amazing how quilting stuff expands to fit the space! You were and still are still beautiful!