A Little Housekeeping in the Studio

That title is misleading.  I don't know how to do a little of anything!  I took one corner and began to work on it.  While the optimum way to clean is to take everything out and only put back what you want or need (or suddenly find a place for) there is just no possible way I can do that— not if I plan to survive and drag it all back in again.

There were a lot of choices of messy places, but after careful consideration, I started with the fabric cabinet.  The cabinet is very old, a seven foot tall oak thing that was originally in a hospital in North Georgia.  I've removed the six doors and have fabric (mostly fat quarters) on the upper shelves.

The lower part, also doorless, now houses my work (in plastic flat boxes), two crates of silks, and a large collection of scraps of cottons, and some odd weaves in larger pieces.  The scraps are useful when I need just a little piece of something.  Since I work in small scale, I don't need a great deal of anything, but I do need a lot of those anythings.

Going through the scraps to put them all in one large, rectangular basket, I found pieces from the blouses my mother used to sew.  She made all her clothes, and often re-created things she had seen in magazines or shops rather than make the purchase of a new item.  It was the challenge that inspired her.  She taught us to sew when we were little, and I was wearing clothes I made myself when I was in high school.  What a blessing to have learned that skill so young, and to have been taught by such an excellent seamstress.

Today I need to tidy things a bit— there is so often more mess from a large, serious clean-up than when I started— and take back the table tops!  Carol Warren is coming tomorrow to direct the hanging of the pictures in the house (no one on the planet does this as well as Carol; her house is like a very smart up-scale gallery), and we will, of course, visit the studio.  I would hate to hang my head in shame over its scattered, day-to-day condition.  Other parts of the studio I will sort and tidy on next week, until I've worked my way completely around the room.  I need to have one more piece of furniture to completely hold everything without the nine boxes stacked on a rickety shelf, but finding that is an ongoing project.  By the time I find it, however, I may have used up all the knitting yarn I had planned to store in it!

Today also offers me a chance to go to the grocery store!  I have progressed so well at walking that I can even make the rounds of the Kroger and Publix markets, and Charles' meager selections are now supplemented by interesting things to eat.  Charles is a good man, but he has yet to fully comprehend that there is life beyond meat, potatoes, and ice cream.