Craft Room 2012

For the past few months, I've been redecorating my craft room in the basement. Ever since I moved all my stuff down here, I've been really enjoying the ability to create in a larger space with a TV all my own! While researching craft rooms online for organizational ideas, I fell in love with the many vintage / antique styled rooms. So, here finally are some images of how mine looks so far with the pieces I've acquired since the Fall.

I'll be doing separate posts to detail some of the more interesting items, but for now, here's a slideshow for an overall visit:

Happy New Year!

My Craftoom: 2011

When I first started scrapbooking back about 2006, I had ALL my supplies in three containers strapped to a cart I would wheel out from a closet to spread out on our dining room table whenever I felt the need to get creative. I used two tackle boxes for the smaller stuff and a small Cropper Hopper for my paper. Wow... how far I have come in five years.

I now use daughter's old bedroom (after she moved downstairs); it's small but cozy - a great place to create and relax with the dog at my feet and three cats ever present to keep me company. Other than a single picture of when I repainted and first set up the room a few years back, I don't think I've ever added phots of my entire craftroom here. Be warned however; there are quite a few photos! So if you have the time, grab a cuppa and click on the images to biggify for closer looksees.

First, here is my main workspace. My favorite things about this space are the wooden stamp storage trays (one is a vintage printer's drawer) on the walls, the 6 foot curtain rod for ribbon and the way nearly everything is within arm's reach when I am sitting there. Over  the table I have one long shelf to hold tools such as a Cuttlebug, Xyrons, Cropadile, embossing tools and the like.

Here's a closer look of my workspace. My Copics are in homemade storage containers (wooden doll's dressers sans the drawers with chipboard dividers inserted and everything painted black).

I have been slowly adding antiques to the room; here you'll see my antique glass pen and ink holder, a vintage expandable carpenter's ruler and a little Occupied Japanese ceramic deer I just couldn't resist getting before Christmas.

The metal tool box is great for small embellies from tiny brads to a variety of Wild Orchid flowers. I also scored a free acrylic display box that holds my Copic refills perfectly... can you believe it's a lipstick display? A local drugstore was revamping the cosmetics section and they GAVE me two displays I thought I could put to good use.

To the right of this main table are two smaller desks. The first is an old desk from my aunt that has a wonderful huge single drawer to store all kinds of "stuff" ;) On top I have a few organizers to hold some stamping supplies as well as an antique scale, jar for candies (of course!) and an antique rubber stamp stand. I have a few Sizzix dies and Cuttlebug folders stored here too.

The desk next to that is for my laptop and printer which also has a few antiques... below it is my newest find: a gallon creamer from the early 1900s. I have to figure out what the heck I'll store in it though; when I saw it on eBay I had planned to use it for my paintbrushes, but this sucker is large and heavy! I LOVE it! On the desk is a small ceramic US military jar holding some vintage tools. Beside that is my vintage copper stapler and original Slinky!

Above the printer is my brand new Making Memories Embellishment Center.  I have wanted one of these for a long time; I finally broke down, used a coupon and got it for half price at Michael's. After painting it black I filled it up with my Stickles, alcohol inks, Martha Stewart glitter, ink pads, glosses and some holiday ribbons. On top is antique brass photographer's bird I picked up in Texas last fall. It is from 1907 and was used to get children's attention by chirping and moving it's beak and tail via a tube and ball the photographer would squeeze.

On the wall opposite to my main work table is my shelving unit, paper display and storage cart hubby built for me. The large shelving unit has a few antiques too; a vintage metal Pepsi "basket" holds my Prima flower jars perfectly! The old postal scale is one of my favorite finds from a local antique shop. The two wooden boxes are from trips to Minnesota. I painted and stacked into steps blocks of wood so I could easily see my Martha Stewart punches. Below those are my other punches, paints, binders and scrapbooks. I keep all my unmounted stamps in these binders, along with my Spellbinders dies, stickers and miscellaneous information sheets and pamphlets. To see how I store my Magnolia stamps, take a look at a previous post HERE.

The paper display I bought from our local scrapbook store when it closed. Boy, THAT was fun to repaint (NOT!) , but I love having my 12 X 12 papers sorted this way. Beside this is a wooden cart hubby built for me; I added the drawers and quickly filled them will all kinds of supplies. On top is a display unit daughter pulled out of the trash at work! It's a great find and rotates to store lots of goodies!

The final side of the room houses my sewing machine... so great to have it always set up and ready to use on cards (or, if needed, the odd REAL sewing job! :)  ) I also have a magazine rack I got from a craft store closure, that of course, I had to paint black too.

On the hutch you'll see a few more antiques; a 100+ year old cast iron letter holder, some ink bottles, a cast iron floral "frog" from California, vintage Minnesota cheese boxes and my old pencil sharpener that I have yet to mount somewhere. Oh and if you look closely behind the antique office chair (which, I painted black, natch), you'll see my old 1960's Spirograph sitting on the keyboard drawer under the sewing machine.

So there you have it. A mix of old and new all crammed into my small craftroom; my favorite room in the house!

Easter Card and Organization

With just a few days to go, I still haven't finished my Easter cards! Yikes!

Well, I got ONE done so far. Just a simple card with no extra drawings this time. I guess I'd better get busy tonight to get the other two finished...

Here is a closeup of Tilda on this one. I used lavender Stickles on the egg, and popped her up on dimensionals over some cute paper. These sheets perfectly matched a heart I had previously made for another card but never ended up using - made from a Spellbinder's scalloped heart die, then run through my Cuttlebug for the dot embossing. Copics were used to colour it and then I sanded it down a tad to highlight the dots. Of course, Tilda was coloured with Copics.

I thought I'd include a few photos of my Magnolia stamp organization today. I have 34 of these cute stamps already, and I soon outgrew the small container I was storing them in. So I went out and bought another D ring binder to match the others in my room, plastic dividers and heavy duty top loading full sheet plastic pockets. I cut off the tabs on the dividers and adhered regular copy paper to each one to make them more sturdy to slide in and out of their pockets.


Each page has two stamps; I stamped a sample and then labelled them with some peel off sticker file folder labels. I then keep the stamp itself on the package it came in; it sticks nicely to the outside of the clear envelope! So when I want a certain stamp, I simply pull out the sheet and peel it off the package. Easy peasy!


You may have noticed that spreadsheet on the left... yes, I keep a spreadsheet of all the stamps I have, and want to get in the future. I record the stamp name, an image, where I bought it, when I purchased it, and a few comments about it. It's an easy way to ensure I don't accidentally get a double! (Yes, I AM OCD, how'd you guess???)

I found that when I stacked up the pages though, that I had to alternate the location of packages on the pages; so I adhered the packages on the top of one sheet, the bottom of the next, so the pages would lay flat. I have already nearly filled this binder! (Oh what a shame....) ;)


You may have noticed I have a binder for my Spellbinders on that shelf too. I only have six sets so far, but I store them in a similar way. I purchased full page size magnetic sheets, adhered them to the plastic dividers for stability, then slide them into the same heavy duty plastic pockets. The dies snap to them very well, and it's so easy to see what I need and where it needs to go back! I didn't like that sticky tape they come on; it would often get stuck on my cardstock when I ran them through my Cuttlebug.



Here are the card details:

Background purple paper: K & Co
Matted paper: Magnolia
Stickles on egg: Milled Lavender

Copic colours:

Skin: E00, E11, R20
Hair: Y21, E25, E31
Dress: BV00, BV11, BG10, BG72, N0
Boots: BV00, BV11, N0
Egg: BG10, BG72
Chick: Y11, Y21, YR23

Well, time to get into gear and start thinking about those other cards I need to do. Oh yeah, and plan Easter dinner and some egg painting too...

Looks like it's going to be a busy, but fun holiday weekend! Happy Easter everyone!

My Redecorated Craftroom

A few weeks ago I repainted daughter's old green and purple bedroom; since she moved to a larger room downstairs last winter, I set this one up as a scrapbook / craft / art space. Now it finally looks more like it. New shelves, painted accessories, baskets and desk organizers were also added.

I love working in there; with, of course, a cat or three to around to keep me company.

More images can be found over at 2Peas here in a slideshow format.