Sewing Room Update

DS #2 volunteered to do a little painting while he was home from college, so I turned him loose in the two hardest-used areas in our home:  the laundry room and the back hallway entrance from the garage.

The laundry room had been painted years ago a sort of golden-orange, so when I bought the lighter-colored paint for both areas, I bought 3 gallons, thinking it was going to take a bunch to cover it all.

The sweet clerk said, “that’s some big laundry room.”  I assured him that I knew what I was doing, paid for it all (along with a gallon of “ceiling white”) and hauled it all home.

Two coats over the golden-orange and a coat on the back hallway walls and I still had over a gallon left.  (Obviously the clerk knew he was dealing with, well, someone who didn’t know what she was talking about.  Measure the walls?  Please.)

With very little pleading on my part, DS #2 agreed to paint the sewing room to use up the excess paint.  (The last time I painted the sewing room was also to use up some paint.  I detect a trend here.)

Here’s what it looked like before:The walls weren’t a bad shade, sort of a beige-y tan.  The window in the room faces north, so in the cooler months of the year, the light is very diffused.  Makes it easy to choose paint color because it really can’t be any darker than this.

I’ve written before about my quilting set up, and I was pretty pleased with it for the most part.  The sewing machine was directly under the window with my old worktable off to the left and my fold-up cutting table further to the left against an adjacent wall.

This worked really well for me to swivel between the sewing machine and the cutting/pressing table, except for one annoying problem:  my back was to the door to the room.

More than once while in the throes of battling it out with an uncooperative quilt, poor DH would come in, lean down to give me a smooch . . . and I would jump out of my skin.  Not good for either him or me!

So here’s my new set up:Now I can see who is darkening my door and I can still swivel around to my cutting/ironing area.

“Crescent Moon” is the wall color – a little lighter, a little more yellow than before, but it looks so clean.  (It helps that I vacuumed too, but let’s just admire the paint job and the new set up.)

Here’s a little different angle of my sewing area:My sewing table is very small, and I love need demand the extra work area that allows the quilt weight to overflow my white sewing table and still be supported.

The brown trestle table is from the days of my very first apartment, so it has a lot of wear on it, but it’s great for crafts and quilting.  I have two little fold up  side tables that I can put to the left of the sewing table to help support quilts as well.

If I had to give just one piece of advice for free motion quilting on a standard domestic machine it would be to work out a set up where the quilt can be fully supported while you sew.  Not having to fight the drag of a quilt – no matter how large or small – against the sewing machine needle is huge.

If I stand with my back to the sewing table, here is the rest of the sewing room:Here is my flannel design wall and fabric stash.  (Well, PART of my fabric stash.  Let’s not get crazy.)  This is as neat as you’re going to see it, people.

And just so DS #2 gets all the credit due him, here is the laundry room:See the orange petals on the sunflower picture – yep, that used to be the wall color.  Well past due time to freshen it up, don’t you think?

And here’s the back hall looking into the laundry room with the sewing room door to the right:The light in the photo is a little funky, but it’s all the same “Crescent Moon.”  No more scrapes, fingerprints, dings – ahhh.  Who knew that having the hall painted could bring such peace (especially since I didn’t have to do it myself!)

Now that everything is pulled back together, I can get started on my next project – and I’m so excited to be trying out an idea for a quilt incorporating circles!

All the best – Chris