A Place to Make and Do.

Thought I might share with you my new love... 

My sewing room!

Ever since I lost my job, my study has been a place I didn't really dare to go. Apart from being one of the rooms we never got around to decorating when we moved in 2 years ago, and having boring white walls that were horribly blemished by badly polyfilled holes. It felt a bit weird in there. I had spent so many hours and days and weeks and months of my life sat in there working away - and now that part of my life was over. Well working in that particular job anyway. 

It made me sad to go in there - so I avoided it, and my daughter soon took it over with junk she had collected to sell on eBay (her temporary solution to my current financial crisis - bless...)

Then I suddenly had a lightbulb moment... maybe I could re-decorate, and re-purpose...

Now that my work computer and piles of filing are gone - we only have one small laptop and printer of our own, so we don't really need a study - we all tend to use the computer anywhere but in there. 

Yet at the same time, I am doing a lot of sewing, but I have totally taken over our dining room and every time we want to eat - we either have to balance plates on our laps in the kitchen or I have to clear up my sewing projects so we can eat together.

What if I turned my study into a sewing room... then that would solve two problems in one go... both what to do with this redundant, and rather depressing room. And give us back our dining room for eating in.

Hooray.

I've been reading a book recently too about setting up a business in the craft industry - and in chapter one it impresses upon you then importance of having a space to make and do... perfect excuse to justify a small shopping trip.

So I persuaded my lovely patient husband to come to IKEA with me on his day off - so we could mooch around their storage solutions without the distraction of the little people. 

We bought me a new modular desk with side storage, a desk top and a trestle support... and loads and loads of shelves and hooks and jars and boxes and storage goodies. 

I sold my old depressingly functional workstation desk on eBay and began to construct my new empire. 

I took my son Louis with me to Homebase after school with one of the teal drawer's from my new IKEA desk - to help me choose a matching colour for a feature wall. He encouraged me to be super daring and go for a really bright blue/teal to match the drawer exactly. 

And we bought more boxes...

The next week was spent re-vamping... sanding and staining the desktop, and painting the walls - two feature walls we decided in the end.

I bought some staining wax online in walnut and antique oak and tried out both on my desktop. I expected to like the walnut best, but actually preferred the rustic look of the oak. I stupidly did two big sample corners - figuring I would choose which I liked best and paint over the sample I didn't want, and if it showed through then it didn't matter as that would be the bottom of the desk, and I would do the top with the selected shade once I had perfected my technique... however... on turning the wood over I noticed that it had two massive metal rails embedded in the bottom to attach it to the trestle and storage until part... ooops... so quite a bit of sanding and staining was needed in the end!

The end result was pretty good. Then my husband very kindly put up my shelves for me, and my rails and spice racks...

So now I have a place to make and do. A little sanctuary to retreat into and make things. And I love going in there now, and my daughter loves going in there too, especially when friend's come to visit. 

And best of all - I can make as much mess as I like, and then I can just close the door and leave it all out for next time. It's like a grown up playroom - and what's not to like about that?

"So if you want me - I'll be in my sewing room." I'm still not tired of getting to say that...