Other folks' spaces, part 3

Yes, I know it's Wednesday, not Tuesday, but I'm only a day late (and at least a dollar short).  This will be the final installment of "Other folks' spaces".  If you missed the first parts, click here:  part 1, part 2.

Our last spaces are Tammy Rae's, Kate's, and Jeane's.  All three ladies are from the Loose Bead Society.  I hope you enjoy!

Tammy Rae

I thought I had more from her, but I seem to only have one picture.  Tammy Rae does lampworking (making glass beads, pendants, and more), and her pieces are very popular among the Loose Bead Society members.  Here is a picture of her space:

There's a lot going on here, but I can tell you that everything has a place because when you're working with an open flame, you don't have time to go hunting for something.

Kate

I don't have any pictures of Kate's space, but I can tell you that her house is beautiful and airy and full of whimsical decorations.

Here's what she has to say about what she does and where she does it:

I bead. I sew. I make cards. I decorate boxes. I crochet. I make purses of various materials. I try just about any craft that comes along and have the tools required for each and every one of them!

My craft space:
I have a large "sewing" room in the basement. It is filled to overflowing with crafting materials. There is presently little counter space to work because everything is such a mess. If it were all cleaned out, if would be grand, but I never seem to get it all sorted and put away properly. So, I often end up crafting elsewhere in the house, especially the kitchen, which is sunny and bright for much of the day. I also like crafts that are portable that I can take in the car on a trip or do on my lunch at work or take to a friend's house to do while chatting.

Jeane

Jeane was the last person to send me pictures and a description of her space.  It looks like she has quite a large area with lots of storage!

Here's what she has to say:

Well, I'm not as sophisticated as some... but I am a passionate beader and scrapbooker and stamper... and you certainly can "borrow" anything I do here. 

So here's a picture of my creative board... I used magnetic paint (and man, did it stink) and I just love the results.

The stamp storage closet. Actually my storage takes on many styles... and there's so much of it... do you think I ought to get rid of some stuff?

My favorite part of the room is the "tree" in the corner... and my work table... and the kitty!

She mentioned a creative board, but I don't see it in the pictures.  I DO see a number of Stampin' Up! sets, though, as well as paper and bins and the kitty!

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Thank you to everyone who participated in my little contest!  Happy organizing and crafting!

Other folks' spaces, part 2

I've decided to not try blogging more than once a week and to not blog less than once a week.  Tuesday will be the day, and since it's Tuesday, it's time for a blog!  I've even written it into my calendar every Tuesday until 2014 so I remember.

If you missed part 1 of "Other folks' spaces", click here.  We looked at Judy's room, discussed my mother's project basket, and looked at Sue's workspace.

This week we'll see Sylvia's library, Cindy's work area, and Sherry's comfortable crafting/lounging chair and her very organized desk at work.

I see in my last post that the headings ended up all the way to the right, so I'm going to try something else.

Sylvia

I met Sylvia on a Cricut message board back in 2009.  We hit it off, and when she and her husband visited family in April, 2010, she visited me as well, and I blogged about it (check it out here).  Then a few years later I blogged about pages I scrapped about our visit (read about it here).  Sylvia and I are friends on Facebook, where we like to discuss the odd eating habits of our cats.  Our Pixel and Katy are crazy for Bugles (Cindy calls them "corn horns") and Doritos, but Fe doesn't care for them.  Read below for what Sylvia's cat likes to eat.

Anyway - on to Sylvia's craft room/library.  Sylvia scraps (as you already know if you read the blogs), but she is also really into genealogy.  I like genealogy, too, but I find it's quite the time suck, and it's easy to get confused.  Sylvia seems to have the same issues:

So I finally got time to sit down and get these pictures out to you! Gad, what a weekend. Some lady emailed my uncle that he and I were wrong about our family tree and that really got me hot under the collar!! This was Saturday morning and needless to say I spent the weekend proving her wrong! But, even after e-mailing her all of the evidence, she still wants to stick to her story. Very maddening! Why people can't listen to reason is beyond me!

Here is my craft room/ library. My desk has 3 drawers dedicated to genealogy files, as are two drawers in the cabinet under the TV. Then there is all of my paper, which I have been weeding through these past couple of weeks. I have way too much paper!!  All of my Cricut cartridges are in the closet, I forgot to take a picture of that. Oh well. Then there are the book shelves filled with books, but the tall one (with all my Star Wars Legos on it) is pretty much all loose paper totes, embellishments, ribbon, and card making supplies. All my plants are up high because Onyx loves to eat them. One of her favourite things to do is sit on my desk and stare at the plants. I think she's trying to figure out ways of getting to them!

What I like about my space is that it's cozy and I have a view of the open space and golf course behind the house. What I don't like is the fact that it is too hot in the summer and in the winter, I get the sun in my eyes from just after sunrise to about 10 am. It sucks to have to keep the blinds closed in the morning.

I'm sure you figured out that Onyx is her cat.  :)  Since I have not personally seen Sylvia's library, since she's in Colorado, I'm just going to give you the pictures as she sent them:

What a sophisticated, cozy space!

Cindy

Cindy was another one who participated in the Loose Bead Society panel discussion on organization.  In entering my contest, she just sent me what she had prepared - a 22 page PDF!  I'm not going to extract and post all of that, but you'll get enough of an idea on what she does.

Studio overview:

I am lucky enough to have a dedicated studio space. I am so grateful I don’t have to drag everything out and then put it away again every time I want to work on something.

This does, however, encourage bad behavior. I leave way too much stuff out that seems to never get put way until I just can’t take it any more,

Cindy and her husband, Russ, (I've talked about both of them from time to time here) share a large room in their basement.  Russ builds remote control cars and other things, and Cindy designs and makes jewelry - beaded, chainmaille, and polymer clay (among other things, I'm sure!).  They recently redid the whole room, putting up shelves and reorganizing everything.

Here is Cindy's main work space:

I can assure you, the desk NEVER looks that clean.  :)  Remember she took pictures for a presentation.  Granted, she did include a "before" picture, but I'll spare you that.  You're welcome.

On the wall directly to the left of her desk she has a number of bamboo drawer organizers:

She bought them for a song, and Russ was able to attach something to the back of each of the boxes so they could be hung on the wall.  They can be easily taken down and put back up.  She stores many of her seed beads in these boxes.  They're functional and also provide a neat design element!

Here's a closer look at the area behind the desk:

As you can see, she has a number of rolling carts.  The drawers are labeled.  I love these rolling carts, too, especially those with drawers that are actual boxes with lids.  You can just take the box and go.  The surface on the above rolling carts is a regular hollow core door she got at Home Depot for less than $20.  If you don't have rolling carts to rest it on, you could probably attach it to a wall with brackets where the studs are.  Put a piece of thin plexiglass on it, and you have an instant desk!

To the left of the door-desk, Cindy has a dedicated photo booth:

She keeps it set up at all times so she can quickly take pictures for Etsy listings or whatever.  She's still trying to find the right lighting for optimal picture taking, which is always a difficulty!

Turning the corner, she has a dedicated polymer clay oven and even more drawers:

Whew!  That's Cindy's space in a nutshell.  She has extra storage way to the left of this last picture - past the TV, past Russ's desk, and over on the wall where they share some shelves.

Sherry

Sherry was a coworker of my husband's, a hundred years ago (or six), for the Daily Commercial newspaper in Leesburg, Florida.  Steve says he's the one who hired her, so she can blame him for that crappy job.  :D

Here's what she sent in:

I'm so glad Steve shared the link to your blog and giveaway! I am one of those craft-loving people who try something, get frustrated and then move on to a totally different project in hopes I'll be awesome right away. That hasn't exactly worked out...but I'm optimistic (haha).

Picture 1: This is where (the wannabe) creative magic happens: a Papasan chair. It serves not only as a comfortable bum rest but also a depository of failed projects like knitting. In this picture, there is an Android tablet that I put down after not finding pictures I wanted for Pinterest. The knitting needles are not pictured—because when I saw them, I realized I shouldn't leave such sharp objects lurking around, even for a picture. (Ow, I broke my Kindle that way!) I love my chair because it's comfortable, but I need a more dedicated work space with storage.

Picture 2: It's my desk at work. I couldn't remember whether you wanted just home spaces, so here you go. It's fairly straightforward, even down to the stress ball I haven't needed to use much since leaving newspapers. I love the storage and the walls to pin things on. I used an Ikea Finlir photo frame as a postcard holder. Looking at it on my picture, though, I realize I could decorate/organize better!

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Okay, that completes 2/3 of my contest entries!  Come back next Tuesday for the rest, then I'll go on a different topic.  Possibly knitting, because I made a really cute baby hat for Steve's coworker's son.  I also have a book review I'm about 3 years late on, and there's a review for some new crimping pliers I just got from Xuron, and... Goodness!  I'd better stick to my every Tuesday blogging schedule!

Other folks' spaces, part 1

Welcome to June!  It's been nearly 3 months since my last post.  My "summer resolution" (Yes, that's a thing.  I just made it up, so of course it's real.) is to post more frequently.  If I don't, feel free to e-mail me at traci@creative-pursuits.biz to give me gentle kick.

Here's what happened since my last post:

• I was a vendor and participated in the Make 'n Take event at the Madison Art Glass and Bead Show.  It was great fun but also an awful lot of work.  I look forward to doing it next year, but I've asked Steve to help me.  It was a bit too much for me to do on my own.
• I recovered from the Madison Art Glass and Bead Show.  :)
• I've had a few health issues.  Nothing serious, but it's been annoying.
• My mother's cancer has come back.  We're pretty worried, as the treatment is harsher this time, and her blood isn't cooperating very well.  Along with harder chemo, she's going to get stem cell treatment.  If you'd like updates on how she's doing, please check out her page on caringbridge.org: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/anneliehinks.  You can even sign up to get e-mails when I update her journal.
• This past weekend was the Bead&Button Show.  I did a lot of marketing for my class, "Tubed Key, or Not Tubed Key", but unfortunately I had no registrations.  They kept the class open as long as they could, and they let me keep my table at the Meet the Teachers reception.  That was a lot of fun as was working the Loose Bead Society table and shopping.  Lots of shopping.  Poor Steve's feet nearly fell off.

But we're here to finally see the creative spaces that people sent in for free Zinio magazine subscription contest.  Since I have information and/or pictures of nine different spaces, I'm not going to show you them all at once.  We'll do a few in each blog post, and I'll try to post a blog a week.

Judy 

Our first space is Judy's.  She and I frequently discuss storage as well as details of running the business such as pricing, branding, table displays, keeping up an inventory program, and much, much more.  She participated in a panel that the Loose Bead Society had at the beginning of the year on how to store your stash.

Like me, Judy is fortunate to have a dedicated room for her studio.  She reorganizes it as much as I do, too.  When she sent in the pictures she told me she was getting a new desk that matches the L-shaped desk in the below picture.  She writes:

Originally, I was just going to buy a black "writing desk" with a drawer to complete the "U" but figured I'd rather have it match the desk if possible since I've already got such a hodge-podge of "furniture" in my studio.  I wanted the drawer to hold my earring cards, tag ribbons and the like so that packaging material would be at my fingertips all the time.  The matching desk I ordered has a keyboard tray which I'll used to store those "finishing items." Not exactly what I wanted but I think it will look better overall.  :)  Now to get more Ott-Lites and more drawers.  I will wait until the desk arrives for those.

At this station she stitches and has her computer for inventorying and the all important Facebooking.

 To the left of this desk there's a closet, and to the left of that are these amazing sets of drawers:

She has all of her beads organized by size, and the bright colored stickers you see below have her inventory numbers on them:

I should mention that the inventory program she uses is the same one I use, Jewelry Designer Manager.  Our friend Cindy uses it, too.  It is an awful lot of work to put your stash into the program (both parts and finished pieces), especially when you start out, but it's a great way to help you price your items.  You can also keep track of who bought what finished piece when and what colors of Delicas you have and where they were the cheapest.  After shopping at the Bead&Button Show I have quite a bit of entering to do.  I'm procrastinating on that by writing a blog post.  :D

To the left of these drawers is the door out of the room, and turning the final corner is her hutch:

Judy was one of the inspirations for me getting my old china cabinet into my studio (you can read about that here).

Annelie (Mom)

After the original contest deadline, I still had a number of spots to fill.  I relaxed the rules and extended the deadline.  I requested full name, e-mail address, what craft(s) are done, description of the creative space with or without pictures, and what magazine folks wanted.  Then I put pressure on my mother to send me something, since entries were not flooding in.  Here is her response:

Hello,
My name is Annelie Erika Kant Southern Hinks

The craft I do most is crocheting and knitting.  I have also done cross stitch and various other projects.

I mostly have the project I'm working on in a big wicker basket in the living room.  I also have a closet in the sun porch which holds all my extra materials.  I have so many different yarns that I have purchased over the years to do something or else and never got around to it.

The magazine I would be interested in is Simply Crochet.

Thanks
Mom

She took me quite literally with her full name, huh?

My mother likes to crochet large afghans which usually have panels.  Panels are a pain in the butt because if you're not consistent in your gauge, you can have one panel a good three or four inches longer than the last one.  Mom keeps herself busy by crocheting and taking apart panels and crocheting them again.  She also likes the complicated patterns, where I'm happier working with solid colors or simple patterns.  She does amazing work, and she has donated many hats, lap afghans (lapghans), and full afghans for various causes over the years.  My stepfather, John, recently bought her a pattern to knit an Airedale.  Yes, he wants her to knit an actual dog, not just a depiction of the dog.  John's sister is involved with an Airedale rescue, and they have an auction every year.  The last few years Mom donated full afghans, but next year John hopes they can donate a knitted dog.  I'm thinking we should teach him to knit so he can do it!

Sue

Let's do one more with pictures.  Sue and I worked together what seems like a hundred years ago.  We lost touch, but through LinkedIn (If you're on there, look me up!) and Facebook, we've reconnected.  In her own words, her space needs a lot of help, and she would love any advice anyone can give her:

Okay, here's the pics...as you can see there is NO system whatsoever!  It's all laying out on a table or hanging from a corkboard.  Yuk!  I do like having everything where I can see it...I am kinda visual, and out of sight out of mind definitely applies to me.  I'm just trying figure out a way to have everything within eyesight but to not take up every inch of table space.  I don't need the findings to be out so those can be in a box of some kind, but I need to be able to see the beads...it helps the creative process. Any advice is welcome!

One thing I suggested is that she put the beads in the muffin tins into baggies.  I can't count the times I thought something loose like this was safe but it went flying.  She has a corkboard on one wall with finished pieces on there.  Perhaps the pendants in the second picture could be pinned up there as well so they're still in sight but off of a horizontal surface.

I completely understand the out of sight, out of mind thing.  When I was moving beads I rarely use from tackle boxes to baggies so I could put them in drawer organizers (see the blog post about the china cabinet, sixth picture), I kept saying, "I forgot about these!  I should do something with them!"  Since I don't do a lot of stringing anymore, I was happy to put them in drawers.  I plan on taking a lot of time between now and the Donna Lexa Memorial Art Fair I'm doing on August 17th to string a number of necklaces, bracelets, and earrings to use up some of these beads.

For Sue, though, I think she would benefit from having clear boxes and drawers that she can keep out on her table.  I saw a number of them the last time I was at The Container Store, and I just did a search for "clear jewelry box" on their website.  They have closeable boxes, small drawer boxes, clear acrylic trays, an acrylic necklace keeper, and more!  No, I don't get commission.  I should, though.  I like the necklace keeper because you can see what you have without dust getting on everything.  Same goes for the boxes and drawers.  I have a few items from them I bought years ago with the same construction as this three drawer box.  The sides are soft, but there's metal reinforcing the edges.  They're durable, and I love that you can see inside.  I have a six drawer box that holds my loose ribbon.

Anyone else have ideas for Sue?  E-mail me at traci@creative-pursuits.biz, and I'll pass it along!

Whew!

Hi!  I finally have enough people to submit to my contest for free online magazine subscriptions from Zinio.  That's what the "Whew!" in the title is all about.  Who knew it would end up being so difficult?

Here are the lucky winners (first names only) and the magazine choices they made, in the order that they sent me their stuff:

Judy - National Geographic
Sue - Bead Style
Sylvia - Who Do You Think You Are
Cindy - Art Jewelry
Sherry - AFAR
Mom (yes, that is her first name) - Simply Crochet
Tammy Rae - Lapidary Journal Jewelry Artist
Kat (Kate, Kathy) - Bead Style
Jeane - Architectural Digest

I found a few of the subscription choices interesting.  I hope everyone enjoys their subscriptions and will tell me all about how they like Zinio!

The Madison Art Glass and Bead Show is NEXT WEEKEND (eek!), so I'm going to continue to be very busy getting ready for that.  I'll try to post at least once with my winners' craft space pictures and information.

Until then... happy crafting!

Contest winners

Hi, folks!  I've been holding off on blogging because I was hoping for a few more entries into the contest.  I needed at least nine people to send me pictures of their creative space (studio, office, corner of the room, etc...) to be posted here for an online magazine giveaway from Zinio.  Unfortunately, I have only received 5 entries:  Judy, Sue, Sylvia, Cindy, and Sherry all get free magazine subscriptions.

One of the terms of the contest is that I have to give away all 9 subscriptions (well, it was 10, but I took one so I could talk knowledgeably about it) at the same time.  Basic math tells us that I need 4 more people to give the subscriptions away to.

I'm going to assume that you've all been shy about showing me your spaces and that's why you didn't send me pictures.  Let's try something a bit different - the first four people who send me an e-mail with just a description of their space and the type of craft(s) you do will get subscriptions.  It's not as fun as seeing pictures, but I do not want to hold up the subscriptions for the five winners any longer.

So send an e-mail to traci@creative-pursuits.biz with the following information:

• Your full name
• The e-mail address you want to use for the magazine subscription (or I will use the one you sent the message from)
• What magazine subscription you want (see the Zinio website for the thousands of magazines they offer)
• A description of your working and storage space for your crafts - where do you do it and how do you store your supplies when you're not actively creating
• What kinds of crafts you do

Again, the first four will get subscriptions, but everyone who sends me SOMETHING will get mentioned in the blog at some point.

Before I go, I'd like to tell you about more classes that are being offered at the Bead&Button Show.  These are from Sara Oehler from SoftFlex.  She has two Russian Spiral classes, a class all about earrings, and a bead-weaving bracelet class, all using SoftFlex beading wire.  I've used this wire before - it's very supple and comes in a large number of beautiful colors!  Check out Sara's blog post to see pictures and more information about her classes.

Don't delay - send your e-mail to me today!

Upcoming bead show classes

Hi, all!  Before we get into my upcoming classes, I want to remind you that I have a contest for free Zinio magazine subscriptions going on.  You can read the whole thing at the bottom of my Can't leave well enough alone post from last week.  The gist of it is:

Since I'm always yammering on about my studio, and since we had a whole presentation on studio and bead organization at our last Loose Bead Society meeting, I want to see YOUR workspace.  Whether you have a full room like I'm lucky to have, a corner of the bedroom, a shelf or two in a closet, some shelves in the dining room, or a basket of yarn by the couch, I want to see it.  E-mail me at traci@creative-pursuits.biz and send me a picture or three of your area - where you store things and/or where you work - with a description of your space and the types of craft(s) you do.  Tell me what you like and what you don't like about your space.  Also give me your full name, your e-mail address, and which magazine subscription you'd like.  I will post everyone's entries (without the full name and e-mail address, of course), and if I happen to get more than 9 entries, I will draw names out of a hat.  I'm sure I have a hat around somewhere.

The deadline for the contest will be Wednesday, February 20th at 8:00 pm Central time. (see update below)  That should give you all plenty of time to clean things up a bit and to get me your pictures.

So far I have only received TWO entries!  That means there are seven more magazine subscriptions up for grabs.  Grab your cameras (or smart phones or tablets with cameras) and snap a pic or two of your space.  Don't forget to look at the available magazines on the Zinio website and let me know which one you want.

Update:  As of today (2/22/2013 at 11:19a CST), I only have three entries.  Since they got in before the deadline, they automatically get free subscriptions.  I am going to keep the contest going for another week, so you now have until Wednesday, February 27th at 8:00 pm Central time to get me your pictures and enter the contest!

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Did you know that I'm going to be teaching classes at two bead shows in 2013?

The first one is the Madison Art Glass and Bead Show in Madison, Wisconsin held at the end of March.  The show itself is March 23-24, and I'm going to have a table there selling kits and tutorials of my designs as well as some supplies.  Classes start on March 22nd, and I'm going to teach my "Double Decker Daisy" design that day:

This bracelet uses twin seed beads (or Super Duos), 8/0 seed beads, 15/0 seed beads, 6mm fire-polish or bicone crystals, and daggers.  This is a good introduction to the twin seed beads and how to add height to your projects.  I have a number of color choices available.  Click here for all of the information and to sign up.


The second bead show class I'm teaching is at the Bead&Button Show.  It's held at the beginning of June in Milwaukee, WI.  I'll have a table at the Meet the Teachers event on Wednesday, June 5th, and my "Tubed Key, or Not Tubed Key" class is Sunday, June 9th:

This class teaches how to make embellished peyote tubes that can be used to wrap around keys or to use as elements in a necklace or bracelet.  You can choose your own colors and how elaborate you want your necklace to be.  The kit comes with two large keys and four matching mini keys for earrings.  Here's a close up picture of the earrings:

They're so cute!  Click here for all of the information and to sign up.


I hope to see you in my classes or at my tables at either show (or both)!  If you know anyone who might be interested, please share this blog post with them.  Better yet, share it on Facebook and/or Pinterest - the more the merrier!

Can't leave well enough alone

(Make sure you read through to the bottom of the post - there's a giveaway opportunity down there!)

Hi!  Yes, it's been a long time between posts again.  The Christmas selling season went well and the non-selling part of Christmas, too!  In January Steve brought a cold home from the office, and that laid me out for a while.  It usually does.  There have been some other personal challenges, but I'm nearly past all that (I hope), and I'm gearing up for a new year.  Details on that to come in another post.

One of the challenges I've been dealing with for years is my house in Waukegan.  I won't go into all the gory details here, but suffice it to say that I've entered into an agreement with the mortgage company to take the house (and mortgage) off my hands and onto theirs.

The reason I'm mentioning it at all is that it provided me with yet another opportunity to reorganize part of my studio.  In case you're new to my blog or need to refresh your memory:

Original post about my craft room
Part 1 of reorganization
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

One would think I'd leave well enough alone.  I had lots of space, and while it wasn't clean all of the time (or at all since the Christmas selling season started), I had a place for everything.

When I decided to give up my house and not try to rent it anymore, I had a dilemma:

Back in 1998 Dave (not my current husband) and I were living in a shabby apartment in Waukegan, Illinois.  We were going to Carpentersville or Algonquin or somewhere for a doctor's appointment for him.  It was a long drive; I remember that much.  We were suckers for stopping at garage sales, and when we saw one shortly after leaving Waukegan (I think it was in Wildwood for those of you following along) we stopped.  I don't know if there was much there we wanted, but in the back of the garage there was this beauty.  There were a few nicks, but all the glass was intact.  There was a $25 price tag on it.  I asked if that was the real price, and they said it was, and I was sold.

Fortunately we had Dave's van.  Unfortunately he had a lot of stuff in it - seats (unsurprisingly), copier parts (he fixed copiers back then), copier manuals, and random stuff that vans seem to accumulate.  Well, we took everything out, seats and all, and we (by we I mean Dave and the guy from the garage sale) carefully put the china cabinet on the floor.  The seats and everything very carefully went on top, and we went on our merry way to the doctor.  I think the drive was about an hour.  Over an hour back home, and the china cabinet was intact.  We crammed it into the eating space of the apartment, and my mother and stepfather thought I was nuts - we really had no space for it and no china to put in it.

That October we moved into a house (the one I'm now giving up), and there was a perfect spot for the cabinet in the dining room.  Mom said, "A china cabinet needs china," and that was their housewarming gift - beautiful white, gray, and black modern-looking china.  Here's a shot of Mom, John, and Steve in the dining room for John's birthday in 2008.  We were playing poker.  I was free to take pictures because I lost all of my chips.

It seems silly to be attached to a piece of furniture like this, but it's a very serviceable piece of furniture that I got for $25!  I think that was actually the first piece of furniture I bought myself.  The table and chairs you see in the above picture were hand-me-downs from the folks in the picture (not Steve), but they were getting all wobbly and were starting to fall apart, so we didn't keep them.

I have always liked studios and craft rooms that use unique furniture.  It gives the room a bit of class.  Brenda (you can see some of what I did in her studio here) painted hers bright colors.  I don't think I'm going to do that, but I did want it in my room.

Getting it here cost way more than the $25 I paid for it 14 years ago.  We had to move out the two tall bookshelves to fit it in:

I had already decided that the scrapbooks would stay on one of the bookshelves that we moved into the bedroom.  The little bookshelf unit that was in there from the last reorganization Steve took down to the basement along with the other tall bookshelf unit.  Then I discovered a dilemma:

If I were to put my jewelry making reference books (which I use fairly frequently) in the cabinet, I wouldn't be able to get to them.  Steve spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out a way to get the two side panels off but with no luck.  He didn't want to gouge the frame that would be left.  So poor Steve moved one of the little bookshelf units back upstairs, and that houses all of those books and magazines with a bit of space leftover.

What I ended up putting in the sides were things I don't use very often.  When I do I'm likely going to take everything in that section out to find what I need, so it's no big deal for them to be harder to get to.

I still have some room to grow, which is always good in any room, let alone a studio.

One thing I did to free up a lot of space was to move my beads that I use for stringing (which I don't do much of anymore) into baggies into drawer organizers I found at The Container Store that fit perfectly into these drawers:

I can fit four organizers in each drawer.  I bought six, which turned out to be the perfect number for the beads I wanted to put in them.  Yes, the beads are crammed in there a bit tightly, but if I'm going to string something I'm going to want to take a lot of them out for planning.  They're organized by color, so that won't be so bad.

WAAAYYYY at the top of this I mentioned there was going to be a giveaway.  Zinio (an online and tablet magazine reading service) contacted me and offered ten magazine subscriptions for me to give away on my blog.  There are going to be a few ads in here for Zinio and their current sales - that's part of the deal.  They have some good sales going on.  Feel free to click the pictures and check them out.

I had heard of Zinio from Steve - we downloaded it on our new iPad that we bought with money Steve won at work (Review of the Year!  I'm so proud!), but we hadn't subscribed to anything yet.  I asked Zinio if I could have one of the subscriptions for myself so I knew what I was giving away (and so I could have a free subscription - Mama didn't raise no fool!), and they gladly let me have one.  Since I get all the Kalmbach magazines I want, I chose Beadwork.

Zinio is not just for iPads, though.  You can read magazines on the computer (PC and Mac) as well as many Android devices.  If you're curious about your device, see if you can install the Zinio app.  For use on Kindle Fire, follow these steps: http://imgs.zinio.com/faq/fire.html.

This sale ends 2/21/2013 

I thought reading the magazine on the iPad would be neat because you can curl up on your couch or wherever and flip through the magazine.  What I didn't realize is just HOW neat it would be.

The first thing I noticed was that there are hyperlinks everywhere.  They're underlined just like on webpages.  Touch them, and you can go to that page in the magazine (like from the table of contents or a different article), send an e-mail, or go to a website.  This was especially cool when I was looking at the ads.  I usually think, "Hey, that's neat - I'll need to remember to look that up," and I always forget to look.  There's an ad for Grace Lampwork Beads with a very cute white bead with a purple iris-looking flower on it.  Every time I see that ad I want to check it out.  However, I have the attention span of a gnat and always forget.  This time.... ::touch:: and I went to the website.  After a brief amount of searching I found the bead.  It's $17 (which is good for a lampwork bead) but out of stock (of course).  I started clicking links left and right to look at all different kinds of things.

The next thing I noticed was the zoom.  I don't think I'd have noticed this as much in a knitting magazine.  In beading magazines there are always diagrams that tell you the thread path for stitching designs.  When you look at a print magazine sometimes they're a bit too small, and you can't tell one thread from another.  Maybe it's just my old eyes.  In Zinio, you can easily double-click (computer) or double-touch (tablet) to zoom in.  If that's not big enough, you can zoom in farther with a sliding control on the computer or the fancy finger-drag thing on the iPad.  If you still can't follow the thread paths then I think you may need new glasses.  :)

This sale ends 2/21/2013

If you like a design or article, you can bookmark it.  I don't know yet if the bookmarks are magazine specific or across all magazines you have downloaded.  Ask me after the next issue of Beadwork comes out.  Even if it is just magazine specific, that will still be useful so I can find those earrings I want to try to make.

On the computer version you can print pages.  I can see this being useful from a knitting magazine so you can mark things up or if you're going to bead with friends and don't want to take your tablet with you.

What kinds of magazines do they have, you ask?  They have single issues and subscriptions for thousands of magazines, both domestic and international.  A very small number of the titles available are: Better Homes and Gardens, Forbes, Wine Enthusiast, Martha Stewart Living, Consumer Reports, Parenting, and even Dog's Life.  I'm not listing them all - that would just be crazy.  You can search from the Zinio website or app.

However, I do want to highlight some of the magazines from the Crafts category that they have available (apart from Beadwork that I already mentioned): Bead&Button, BeadStyle, Art Jewelry, Model Railroader, Fine Scale Modeler, Interweave Knits, Knitter's Magazine, Knit Wear, Interweave Crochet, Crochet Today!, Lapidary Journal Jewelry Artist, PaperCraft Inspirations, Cloth Paper Scissors, American Patchwork & Quilting, Quilts and More, WOOD Magazine...  Again - there are a lot more to choose from than these.

They even have those special issues that magazines put out:  Easy Metal Clay, Favorite Bead Stitches, Halloween (from Better Homes & Gardens), Handcrafted Jewelry, KnitScene, Interweave's Jane Austen Knits, Studios (from Cloth Paper & Scissors)... Those are just a few of the special issues available.

Now that I've talked it up, I'm ready to announce the terms for the giveaway.  They're giving me 10 subscriptions.  Since I'm using one, that leaves me with 9 to give to you.  I want to make this fair, so I'm going to have a contest.

Since I'm always yammering on about my studio, and since we had a whole presentation on studio and bead organization at our last Loose Bead Society meeting, I want to see YOUR workspace.  Whether you have a full room like I'm lucky to have, a corner of the bedroom, a shelf or two in a closet, some shelves in the dining room, or a basket of yarn by the couch, I want to see it.  E-mail me at traci@creative-pursuits.biz and send me a picture or three of your area - where you store things and/or where you work - with a description of your space and the types of craft(s) you do.  Tell me what you like and what you don't like about your space.  Also give me your full name, your e-mail address, and which magazine subscription you'd like.  I will post everyone's entries (without the full name and e-mail address, of course), and if I happen to get more than 9 entries, I will draw names out of a hat.  I'm sure I have a hat around somewhere.

The deadline for the contest will be Wednesday, February 20th at 8:00 pm Central time.  That should give you all plenty of time to clean things up a bit and to get me your pictures.

I'm really looking forward to seeing your workspaces and learning more about you all!