February Organizing Task Two

Posted on February 27, 2021 by prairiemoonquilts in Studio Organizing Challenge

Are you ready for February’s second Studio Organizing Challenge?

How did you do with the first one?

Here’s a before and after of the pile I tackled. It’s not finished yet, and I never even got to the pile on the ironing board.

Before:

After:

I reorganized all the projects in the pile and put a lot of stuff away. I finished a couple tops, reorganized the bins, and there are a couple projects still languishing on my cutting table (gasp! — those need to go!). The pile of bins is now stored in the gap between the chest of drawers and the wall, but eventually, I want that pile of bins gone, too. For now, I’ll settle for it being neater, until I can get further along.

There is still one pile left on that side of the room, but I’m slowly dealing with it, too. My goal is to have all the stuff out of the floor. Then I’ll need to address the other side of the room! I keep going back and forth with the piles — haha!

I have cleaned and sewed my little heart out this month, and feel like I’m making a bit of progress. I hope to continue that, because it feels good, and it’s motivating me to keep going because I like the results. And I still need to deal with the pile on the ironing board, because I still need to change the cover! And wouldn’t it be nice to get to use my entire ironing surface?

I’m finding more UFOs and I’ve started a few new ones, too, but I’ve also finished several things, so my list is actually holding steady. I need it to start going down, though, so I’m gonna keep on sewing as fast as I can!

Since tomorrow is the end of the month, I’ll be spending a lot of time this weekend getting my cutting table back under control, and deciding which projects get to stay on top, and which need to get stored away for the time being.

And now, for our second task of the month:

The only reason I will have trouble with this one is because there are way more than 3 troublesome things left in my studio to deal with. I guess I will start with the 3 most troublesome ones, and go from there. I’ll have to keep you posted on what I choose. I think I might start with the ironing board, since that’s bothering me quite a bit.

Do YOU have 3 troublesome things you can deal with? More? Less? I’d love to hear what they are, and what you plan to do about them.

(If you want a deck of the organizing cards, you can find them in my Etsy shop.)

19 responses to “February Organizing Task Two”

  1. ~Aunt Marti~ says:

    Re Three troublesome things: I find if I choose two “very troublesome” and one “not too troublesome,” I am more likely to complete all three. Bouncing between them keeps me from abandoning the really hard stuff.

  2. Deanna says:

    It would be really handy if I could wave this card like a magic wand at a few things in my life not necessarily related to quilting. Very handy indeed. Mostly my sewing stuff is in pretty good order, but I do need to do a blade change on the rotary cutter and pay attention to that dress that needs altering. Maybe I’ll try to get to some of that today.

  3. Diane says:

    Pretty impressive progress on all fronts! You did amazingly well. Not so much here. I chose to organize my desk in the studio. I thought it might be nice to be able to use that surface. It seems to be a catch all for paper and cloth and dodads. Although there has been some progress, I still can’t see the top. This will be one of my 3. The other two will be my small design board and the work table, that I had promised myself would not become cluttered. That lasted exactly 1 day. I did however finish two quilts and have two more to put the binding on. So I’ll take that as a win.

  4. Wendy says:

    Well, this one is easy for me to name – the top of my dresser (again), the stack in front of my bins, and the top of my sewing table (this is the most difficult one). Yay for your progress this month!

  5. I think I am supposed to report on how many blocks that i’ve made this month

    #105 blocks

  6. Hurray for your progress this month! I did get my task done – I just don’t have a photo yet, but I’ll include that in my Sunday post. Three troublesome things? Hmmm. I’ll have to think on that one. There are so many.

  7. Kerry says:

    Well that was good going! I took a box of fabric out – remnants from the quilt I’m still trying to work on – but got as far as tipping it out on the worktop. Now I have that and the quilt on there. It is a small box so only a few things to refold and put on the shelf before resuming the quilting.
    My 3 things mainly are to finish that quilt – it’s been too long in the making. Second is to tidy the window ledge – overflowing with notepads (unused), odds and ends and even some needlefelting things that need a home! Third is to organise my rulers as they seem to have ended up all over the place and when I want one, I can’t find it – apart from the quilting rulers that are already in a basket with chalk and Machingers at the ready.

  8. Amanda M. says:

    I got most of my pile of blocks sewn into tops. At the moment the current catastrophe is my long arm is broken down due to a broken switch. Even though Gammill’s are made for owners to work on I’m not touching her. I’m waiting on a friend to get time to come down. 3 things to deal with: scrap batting, scrap fabric and my lack of ambition.

  9. PAULA M MORGAN says:

    I finally decided that I wanted all my fabric in one room, which means there were more than 3 areas to deal with… Thank you very much, no really. I started folding my fabric on comic boards, moved all my fat qtrs and less into new annoying piles…to refold and trim to what ever manageable size at a much later date. Those areas you had us clean last month or was it the month before? Well fully covered again! Not for long though!! Enjoying the process – Thank you!

  10. Karen E. says:

    You made good progress, Shelly!

    I did take care of three annoying piles by giving some fabric to a person who will use it. As for three troublesome things, (1) I’ll get several bags of scraps I’ve been saving for a guild member who makes dog beds from them to her, which will get a small mountain out of one corner of my studio. (2) I’ll sort by color and put away a pile of fabrics that have been languishing in that same corner of the studio. (3) I’ll finish another UFO and take it and several quilts to the long arm quilting angel. Most of those quilts are for charity, so that’ll free up one of the tractor seat rolling chairs that lives under the cutting table. Thanks for the inspiration!

  11. Tonia says:

    Generally made good progress this month..even swept the floor today. My main goal for the year is to not carry over any UFO..so one troubling thing will be get one more top turned into a quilt. 2. Get the various battings sorted and turned into pieces that make sense. 3 keep working on deep cleaning. I’d be happy to see one windowsill again.. Sounds like our fearless leader made great progress!

  12. Suzette Harris says:

    I was chipping away at all the piles around here. I guess I need to pick three to reduce or eradicate. Hmmm.. sending you a pic from a challenge earlier. Be on the lookout!

  13. Joan says:

    I have not one but two Valentine quilts in progress that the plan was to work on and finish in February–it did not happen… One day left to at least make some progress and then make a plan for them in March… How to hand quilt the border on a Christmas quilt that I’ve made progress on this month–just that troublesome border left… And of course there are several projects languishing around the house in progress that either need to be worked on or stored away when I deal with the first three mentioned…

    I really like the adverbs you have chosen for these challenges, they stick in one’s memory as reminders if repeated and are motivating for getting things done.

  14. Its nice to see that even the best of quilters has the same piles that I have. Went through bins of patriotic and a pile is getting donated to QOV.

  15. Cindy Wienstroer says:

    I have continued to work on UFOs. My big pile was batting – worked thru it & made table topper sizes. My 3 organize items are 1) put away fabric used in topper 2) organize top of dresser with what need to work on & 3) put papers into file binders or get rid. I have gotten only 28 blocks this month and quilted 1 kingsize, 4 table toppers & will try to get a wall hanging done today! Trying to copy all your progress.

  16. Marlene Clausen says:

    Cleared my cutting table so I can finish a “retro” project: covering the drawers in a cheap, vintage pine chest and an ugly small desk w/gorgeous linen/cotton left over from a large wall hanging. I have two drawers of the chest done. Will finish the other six drawers today. Will have to wait until tomorrow for the drawer pulls from Amazon to arrive to get done-done. I painted the two pieces in early summer . . . so what took me so long to do the drawers. That makes six troublesome things, not three. I AM doing this today. No excuses!!

  17. Beautiful dresser turned ironing board on top! I am in love with this piece in your sewing room.

    Great organizing progress as well!

  18. You did great this month on your organizing! 👍
    I think my 3 troublesome things are;
    1. Get caught up on my SAHRR
    2. Get caught up on my RSC scrappy blocks
    3. Make my January and February colour blocks now that I have actually chosen a block to make for my yearly colour challenge quilt.

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