I'm either all or nothing when it comes to organizing and I can never seem to keep it that way for very long. But trying to plan my sewing out for this challenge has made me realize that I really do need to organize. It would help so much if I could see all of the fabrics and patterns I have in one place without having to dig through bins.
This free printable fabric swatch notebook from The Sew Weekly is awesome! I printed a batch of these out on cardstock and am working on filling them up with swatches. I've been doing a few at a time whenever I get a spare chance, just because I think doing my whole stash at once might drive me insane.
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| Image from The Sew Weekly |
It helps having a physical swatch book that I can look through at home, but what about all those times I'm at the fabric store pouring through pattern books and aisles of fabric wandering "do I have a pattern like this already?" or "do I have enough fabric at home to make this pattern?". There is an iPhone app called isewingroom for all you Apple users, but I have an Android myself (which I love) that doesn't offer any similar apps.
So I had a thought as I was cutting swatches...what if I just scanned my fabric in? Well, I tried it and it works! So I'm uploading all of my fabric (and eventually patterns) to Flickr. That way I can use my phone to browse through my stash next time I'm shopping and trying to make important sewing purchase decisions! Overkill? Maybe. I'll let you all know how it goes.
How do you keep your sewing supplies in order? Do you like to categorize things or do you mostly just deal with the chaos?Labels: organization, tips