My Sewing Space

Pink Chalk Fabrics blog is having a Where I Sew Month, and I thought, why not? You can see my unconventional space. Maybe you'll get some ideas, or give me some!

Once upon a time, I had an actual room with a door to sew in, but then we were blessed with a wonderful grandson (who lives with us) and I gave up my sewing room for him to have his own space. Now I sew in what you might call the front parlor. Just inside the front door to our home. It has very large door ways that lead thru to the dining room, and when I am working on a big project, I close off the access to the dining room with the design walls. The lighting is not the greatest, but I make do, and I get a lot done in here.

This giant table on the right is an old architect's desk. Technically it is an engineer's former desk, given to me by my boss when everything went electronic. I had been dreaming of an elevated surface to cut fabrics on without straining my neck, and can you believe he gave me this for free? I looked these up on Ebay and almost fainted. 1/3 of the top is butcher block - which my Janome sits on - and there are 2 huge drawers underneath. I am lucky to have it.

The gray floor mat under the chair? From Sam's Club. Super comfortable to stand on for hours. Easy to move around when you need to. I highly recommend these. We even used them for wall to wall flooring in Tyler's room. Believe me, Nana and Papa have a much easier time playing on the floor with Tyler now that these foam pads are installed!

You can see the design walls and my current project, the Great Granny Along, closing off access to the dining room. There is a great tutorial there  for this super easy and rewarding quilt along. Join in!


These design walls are easy and inexpensive to make. Insulating foam boards from your local home improvement store, spray on adhesive and some very inexpensive diaper flannel. And they weigh only ounces, so you can move them all around easily. 

There are 4 sets of white cubicle cubbies that hold my quilting magazine collection, patterns, fabrics, notebooks, printouts and some WIPs and UFOs as well. I have a homemade bulletin board behind my sewing machine for inspirations and plans and tips.

I'd like to tell you that this is all of my stash, but who are we kidding? This picture was taken over a year ago, so yes, this set of cubbies is overflowing. Packed to the gills. And not this neat. The rest of my stash still takes up one of the 2 closets in Tyler's room, 6 totes and several boxes that are crammed here and there and everywhere. Tyler recently asked me why my fabric lives in his closet? He didn't understand that his room was something else before he was here, but he accepted the explanation anyway.

If you are sewing at your dining room table, which I have done before, make it your special space. Even if it is only for an hour or two. And have fun!

July already

Summer time.

This is what we've seen almost every day since mid June. Good thing Florida soil is all sand, or we'd be boating everywhere. We had over 14 inches in one day, and 7,000 lightning strikes in less than 2 hours this past Monday.  A lot of Downtown Pensacola has flooded more than once. Florida ain't for sissies.

We have kept busy with crafts, reading the Magic Treehouse series, swimming on sunny days, and many other things so no complaints. Tyler has learned to swim with no floaties and with his face in the pool. In one day! His goal: to get a pair of flippers to wear in the pool to play scuba diver. He got over his fear of water in the ears and is even learning to swim to the bottom to retrieve toys. So proud. Our little fish.

• A friend directed me to another blog where the secret to clean grout was revealed. This may be very boring to some, but if you've lived with impossible, dirty grout for years and wanted to dynamite the floors out of frustration, you'll know what I feel when I say the grout looks NEW!

Before and After. See what I mean?

Its a miracle. Ammonia, vinegar, baking soda and water. Who knew?

Amazing Grout Cleaner Recipe: 7 c water, 1/2 c baking soda, 1/3 c ammonia, 1/4 c vinegar. Spray on, scrub, wipe off.  To be honest, I upped the amounts of everything but the water. I found that letting it sit for a few minutes meant no scrubbing. Just the scrubby part of my floor mop and it was clean! This discovery came after a day of major scrubbing and extra baking soda and lots of wiping up the pasty mess. Forget that! Up the ingredients and let them do the work!

• We haven't got much out of our pallet garden because of all the rain, but we did get one Lemon Boy tomato, one yellow squash and one cucumber. 
• We've planted 3 kinds of pumpkins out in the yard. 
• We added a Slip N Slide to our collection of water play toys. Tyler bought it with his own money.

the proud gardener

the pumpkin patch

the slip n slider

Tula and Friends quilt

You know how your fabrics can be calling you? My bundle of Parisville from Tula Pink, and several modern cuts I started collecting were talking to me. Demanding I make something with them. I love how this turned out. The pattern is called Rectangle Squared from the Film in the Fridge blog. That link will take you to her tutorial. Super easy. Lots of solid needed, and you have to figure it out based on what size quilt you're making, but this is very, very easy to put together.


What are you doing with your Summer? I hope whatever it is you are loving it!