Monday 27 January 2014

Label it...

In my quest to be more organised - and because if I cannot see it, it ceases to exist - I am trying to organise the new craft room before I start to put things away.  So while I am waiting for the last two units to go in there and the shelves and rails to be put up I have been busy thinking about labels....

And what better than My Digital Studio... The Label This Craft Room designer kit for MDS is perfect. It allows me to make easy labels as has   ready made options for all the different items from adhesives through to Washi Tape and it lets me pop the headings into frames that match the label punches I own. It also lets me print blank label frames to add my own headings...which is going to be vital when I need at least a  few labels that say SCRAPS!

I opted to stick with plain black and white labels because they are easy on my tired old eyes and I have printed a few sheets and have started to punch them out and I popped them into a clear envelope for safe keeping...

I will use them to help me decide where everything will go before I start to fill the units...but for now let me share this little pic with you... my first little baggy of labels


Saturday 25 January 2014

On the home stretch

At last I can see an actual craft room emerging from the chaos... but the process has meant that the one room that was completed and fit for purpose has now temporarily found itself full of stuff again as we curse the size of this central London house  and decide oh lets just pop this in there for a minute...

The tape measure has never seen so much action, but the end is in sight and  after three hours of moving things around, we think we have finalised the  layout for the new craft room. It was hard -  we already had so much of the furniture to work with  and needed to make that work in the new room...and we will I am sure.

We have decided to quit for tonight and look at it again tomorrow... of curse the real proof will be when  come to work in there... After weeks of craft room deprivation, I can't wait!

Saturday 18 January 2014

A Victory for common sense...

Finally after submitting a formal complaint (which received an automated response but nothing further)  and three follow up emails to Virgin Media I rang them again and I spoke to a lovely lady who agreed the situation was ridiculous and within a few minutes had arranged that an engineer will call on Tuesday to rectify the problems...and free of charge too.  I am of course very grateful to her for employing common and sense and applying good customer service...but it makes you wonder  why they couldn't have done that in the first place?

As things stand right this minute...the top floor of our house is freezing cold because the  front window frames have been painted today and the paint takes sixteen hours to dry. We had painted two sets using the quick drying stuff but even with a couple of coats the results were pretty awful so this time we have got the proper stuff...stinks to high heaven but goes on like a dream and is glossy white as it should be... Tomorrow we are going to add a coat of super stinky but super glossy to the window ledges that were already painted and  because our bedroom is being decorated as part of this whole upstairs reno thingy we have going on we need to touch up the feature wall with some more suede paint because somehow it got a big splodge of white paint on it at one end of the room  and several speckles of  white (ceiling paint) and pastel rose (end walls). At least we can get those last bits done tomorrow while we are waiting for the Virgin man to come Tuesday and do his thing...

It is no small coincidence that while we were moving books from a pair of shelving units downstairs (tall Billy bookcases with doors on the bottom are coming upstairs into the craft room) we came across an Ikea catalogue... and the current one at that...pristine condition, pages unturned. There is no doubt at all that we will be visiting Ikea very soon...the catalogue will  make great bedtime reading.

The decorating a whole floor of our house in one hit was a crazy idea but has actually been a lot less stressful than I imagined...that said  its been horrid being without my craft room and I am so pleased that the end is now in sight...

The craft room should be taking real shape this week and by this time next week I hope to have some photos to share...


Once again I have to say Watch this space....

Sunday 12 January 2014

And on it goes...

The new craft room was painted what seems like ages ago ... and yesterday the painting of the old craft room was completed.  Amazingly it took one less coat of the same white paint to cover the red walls in here than it did to cover the blah mocha walls in the other room...we are not sure why but suspect the first lot of paint might not have been all that good because when we bought the next lot it seemed to cover so much better ...and it did a great job in here...

So two rooms down and hubby has decided it makes perfect sense to keep going and has started on our bedroom today...especially since we are at the mercy of Virgin media to re-site the broadband connection... thanks to the operative who while upgrading the TIVO, took it upon himself to splice the upstairs tv service to our broadband and cut our broadband cable so short that we can't move the modem more than few inches...

When I rang Virgin  Media I was told that while they could send someone free of charge to sort out the weird cabling the upgrade guy left behind him - we discovered that mess when we emptied this room of all its furniture and were almost strangled buy the half mile of cable that sprang up out of nowhere  - we would have to pay £99 for someone to move the broadband modem. Now this seems a little unfair to me since we had enough cable from our original installation and we want to move the modem back to the original installation point...but we can't because old sneaky cut the cable...but the girl I spoke to would not budge...so I had to make a formal complaint...and we are still awaiting the outcome of that one...

Ironically  while I had to provide my full name ,address with post code, telephone number, account number and security password before she would even speak to me, little miss helpful at the call centre did not feel comfortable giving me her name.... apparently she is concerned that customers might seek her out via social media... I guess she hasn't heard of security settings...or being helpful...

But I digress... back to the craft room...or lack thereof... I am currently reduced to working on a 75cm square table in the middle of the floor. This is not good...stuff falls off the table all the time, there is no room for mess and I plain can't find anything I need...

So the windows are clean, the wood blinds in the entire house are completely dust free, my oven is so shiny you need sunglasses to look in there, the bathrooms gleam and the cupboards are all organised...

The bedroom will be completed in a  few days and  I really hope we get a reply from Virgin Media soon...I am clearly going crazy without my craft room...

I am taking bets that hubby will fall out of bed in the morning...he has taken lots of stuff out of our room in prep for the painting tomorrow and his alarm clock is on the floor... he won't be able to hit it like he normally does...  I am betting there will be alarm sounds, then a thud followed by cussing...

Watch this space ;)

Tuesday 7 January 2014

The horrid stage

We are that most horrid stage in the process...where the decorating of the new craftroom is complete but until the redecoration of the old one is completed we cannot sort either room. I am stuck in limbo.

I have a small table set up in the new room and I have bare craft essentials to hand  but it is far from ideal. The computer and printer is in the old room. Currently I am  sitting on a very uncomfy wooden stool in the middle of the old room , the floor is  covered with dust sheets and I am surrounded by stepladders and paint pots...It is most unpleasant.

I  will be glad when this part is over and I can seriously get to the interesting part.

This bit is no fun at all.

Wednesday 1 January 2014

A Proper craftroom day

Oh the weather outside is (still) frightful....  what better than to stay indoors in the warm and work on the craftroom reno.

I spent an hour or so surfing around gorgeous craft rooms on the web...all of which sent me running back and forth with tape measure in hand to see if I could do that... what am I like? (no need to answer!)

I had in my mind what my ideal craft room will look like when it is completely finished, but  my inner ditherer has emerged and I am horribly unsure that my sketchy plans will actually work...or will the best option...or any other self doubty thingy it can think of. Thankfully my husband is calm and funny and is both strong and patient and promises me it will be fine and it doesn't matter if I want things moved around a bit from the original (non-plan) plan... I wonder what qualifies as  a bit ...  and how far I can stretch that patience of his ...

Anyhow back to the non-plan plan.... The main idea I have (and I am still firmly set on) is that I want stations/zones for certain tasks with the tools/materials accessible right there in that zone... With space being limited (even when moving into double the space of the previous craft room)  there is also a limit to the number of zones I can achieve. I do an awful  lot of die cutting and embossing and a lot of stamping so these are my two main areas...along with a messy pit for the tasks involving those processes that get stuff everywhere...stuff like glitter and glue.

My other main concern is storage..I need tons of storage and more importantly I need it to work for me...which means that I have to be able to see the stuff and it has to make sense to me and how I craft.

Looking at the majority of the ooh wow craft rooms featured around the web most (if not all) of them are beautifully coordinated, with matching cabinetry and pretty decorative touches... they are almost all very neat.  That is not going to be my room....not ever, not in a million years...

My room is hopefully going to reflect me and my crafting...so it will be a mix of functional and fun. The room is completely painted white...ceiling, walls, doors, window frames and skirting boards...its all bright white and sparkly clean (at the moment.. ) The floor is a warm light oak. I have intentionally chosen a complete mix of  assorted wood shades ranging from light beech to dark wood, with some black and white draw sets thrown in for good measure  and  I am hoping that the distinctions will define the zones and help me to organise my stuff ...and keep it organised.

But my blank canvas will not be stark...there will be colour...from storage options - a variety of pretty boxes and baskets and jars -  and  from the stash itself.... All the pretty papers, ribbons, fabrics, buttons and bows will be on display and will add colour.

But I am getting ahead of myself here... and I really should stop day dreaming about the end result and get on with putting the shelving units together and wiping off the dust-bunnies...

The weather outside can do what it likes..until I need to head to Ikea - and I will need to head there before too long... I am as happy as can be just pottering and dreamin'....