Carla’s February Challenges – The Dreaded Craft Room!

Last week I was supposed to declutter the spare room and edit, print and organize  my Japanese photos. Also I was supposed to do the No (Low) Spend Challenge. I bombed out big time and didn’t do any of it! I think it was because I was constantly out during the week and I was still exhausted from the previous week’s challenges.

As far as the No (Low) Spend challenge goes this week, I’m aiming to not use my credit cards and spend as little as possible. I don’t have much money coming in this week (probably about $90 to $100 – that doesn’t have to cover groceries, petrol, medications and other major bills though) so I’ll try to do better than I did last week. My post tomorrow will be about what I spent last week (ugh!) and what I intend to spend this week.

This week, my decluttering challenge is THE CRAFT ROOM! Here are some BEFORE photos:

When we bought our house, the downstairs area was used as premises for a family business. We also had a business that we’re involved with working there for a few years, until it grew too big for the space. We could then claim that space for us to use as a family. I’ll show you photos of others areas of downstairs in upcoming posts, but today I’m going to concentrate on the reception area, which is now my craft room.

This is the reception desk, which is my office space. I’m not the tidiest of workers, as you can see!

To the right of my office desk is my craft desk – again a mess! A re-purposed medicine cupboard holds my Stampin’ Up ink pads. The trolley below the desk is used to sometimes transport craft stuff when crafting away from home. At the moment it’s full of empty bags, that might be useful one day

The cupboard next to the craft table holds my Big Shot and some of the accessories. The cupboard space underneath is virtually empty!

This is the next cupboard. It holds most of my craft accessories, like chipboard alphabets, flowers, brads etc.

On top of the cupboard is where I store my Christmas-related papers and accessories. The cane basket, if not used this Easter, will finally be flung.

On main shelf I store my A4 Stampin’ Up cardstock. The also is a folder which has copies of card designs in it.

Inside some of the cupboards and drawers. More cardstock, inks, empty containers and various sized envelopes are some of the things inside them.

Here is more scrapbooking crap above the Big Shot cupboard.

This trolley is supposed  to hold all my scrapbooking papers but they don’t all fit ! (The door goes into Mr Sammyleia’s office.

Going clockwise around the room, here are more cupboards and bookcases.

The shelf on top of the cupboard holds most of my punches and jars of buttons. There are also racks of scrapbooking paper there. There is also a lot of stuff that needs to find a home. Funny enough, some of the cupboards are empty! I’m very much a visual person and like to be able to see things rather than have them hidden away, but it’s not a very tidy way to live!

My ribbons are stored in these 2 drawers and in empty coffee jars in this bookcase.

The large bookcase holds my stamp sets (some vertically in clear containers) and folders of card ideas. The CD shelf is for cases of unmounted stamps and scrapbooking CDs .

This is a pile of my husband’s crap that he left on my floor! I got him to throw most of it out and the rest will be dumped into his office to sort out himself!

Some boxes of beer and wine that need to be stored elsewhere, plus some rubbish to be flung.

This is a front view of the reception desk. The 2 bags in front of it are bags that I take with me when I scrapbook at the shop. The other 2 items are paper cutters that don’t work properly any more. I’m taking them to the scrapbooking shop to see if there are parts available to fix them, otherwise I’ll fling them. They cost a bit, but I guess they’ve had lots of use over the years. (Little Leia is saying hello! )

The top of the desk is cluttered with stuff, including things that I’ve made and that others have made for me. I like having these on display, but I guess I need to cull the display a bit!

It has taken me hours to take, edit and post these photos (including other photos of downstairs rooms that I’ll post later), and that’s without doing any decluttering! I will work on this area over the week and post my progress. I have a lot of craft stuff as I used to work in the industry, but some of it has gotta go!

A couple of days ago, I saw in an Aldi catalogue a Butcher’s Trolley for sale at $149.

Our kitchen is lacking in workspace and storage and we have discussed buying something for the centre of the room. It took us a few hours to finally find an Aldi store that had one available. Mr Sammyleia bought it and a recipe book with dividers that I plan to write the recipes that I use in, so that I can fling all those recipe books. Here is a photo of the trolley – which still needs to be constructed:

I’ll take photos when it has been assembled and is in the kitchen.

That’s enough photos for now!