storage – Felting and Fiber Studio

Moving Studio Space.

April 19, 2015 shepherdessann Comments 22 comments

I am moving my studio over one room. The space is exactly the same size. You would think no problem, easy peasy. Not so. You still have to empty all the shelves and pack up everything. I did get a new old set of shelves that holds my wool better.

I moved the carder and my felting table in to one end.

The door will disappear and the table will move out form the corner once the other room is empty. I have my bins for shows under the table and the one set of storage bins under the end.

The other end has my book case, wool and other fiber storage.

The clothes wrack is on wheels I got it at the Target going out business sale.

I should have enough room to do some teaching. I have room to put up a couple of 6 foot tables. I like the way it’s set up it’s not crowded and feels more inviting than the old set up. I am really looking forward to getting back to work in it.

Did you feel the but coming? The problem is the stuff that’s left behind. I want most of it but what to do with it. For the moment and I hope short term it will be packed up and be stored. the sewing machine will go into the nest room along that eventually will be mine but it needs to be renovated and the plumbing fixed so I have sinks. Then I will have no excuse for not washing the fleeces I have.

You never know how much stuff you have until you have to move it. :O)

Keeping Track of Supplies

April 25, 2014 zedster66 Comments 25 comments

We’ve talked a few times about how we store our felting and craft supplies, but how do you keep track of what you have so you know when you’re running low? Do you have a system? I don’t have enough room to keep the whole amount of my wool and fibre supplies out, so I usually keep some out to use…

… and the rest ‘spare’ in bags (or pillow cases!) out of the way in cupboards.

This often leads to me running out of certain breeds or colours, or in some cases, ordering twice because I forget that I checked before the last time I ordered. I decided to do an inventory of all my supplies and stock this week, so I know exactly what I have, then I can try to find a way to keep a better track of it all. I thought the easiest way to do this, would be to put an old sheet down on the floor, get everything out…

… make lists …

and weigh it all.

I had some Word documents with lists of what I usually use from the last time I tried to be better organised, so I started with those and did print outs for my supplies and also for what is ‘spare’. I decided I’d start with my ‘natural’ wools and do the dyed wools and fibres another day. I have my natural wools split into lights and darks, and I also separate the commercial tops from the locks, scoured and carded wools. I know it sounds like a lot of messing about, but it is easier for finding what I want with limited space.

I wasn’t thinking when I started with the light colours. I weighed everything first, then added to the supplies I keep out if they were getting low. But when I did the dark colours, if any of the supplies were low, I added to them before writing down the weight, so I didn’t have lots of scribbled out numbers or have to do two lots of weighing 🙂

So, now I have huge lists with the weights of all my supplies, and spare supplies, do you have any tips or advice about how to keep track of it all better? The only thing I can think of is to weigh the supplies again after each use and also the spares each time I get more out.

UPDATE: I have uploaded a couple of Word documents, altered from the lists I made doing my natural wool supplies inventory, in case anyone wants to use them for themselves. They are in tables, but are easy to alter to suit you. For a list of Commercial wool tops in different breeds, click here then click the link to open the Word doc. For a list of scoured, washed and raw wools, locks and fleeces, click here for the Word doc attachment.

Wool Supplies and Samples

February 18, 2013 zedster66 Comments 24 comments

While I was laying out my white texture felt piece the other week, I had all my bags of white and light grey wools spread out on my floor, along with my stash of raw wool locks, so I thought I may aswell go ahead and do an inventory of my white wools, to see if I’m running low on any and need to order more. I usually keep a small stash of each wool breed (or colour) out in my felting boxes and put the rest away in my supplies bags and boxes, it makes it easier to have a large selection of breeds or colours to choose from without taking up as much room. These are the white wool tops, scoured and carded wools I most commonly use.

My favourite raw wool locks are Gotland, Teeswater and Wensleydale. There’s also some raw mohair locks here.

After scribbling down the names of all the different wools I commonly use, I checked whether there was a good amount in my felting box and whether I was low in my supplies and needed to order more. This took a while, and it suddenly occured to me that if I made myself a document on Word, I could print it out any time I needed to do another stock check. It’s only taken me about 4 years of felting to think of that 🙂

WHITE WOOLS INVENTORY

A few years ago, I spotted some really inexpensive index card holders in our local supermarket. I thought they would be perfect to use for wool samples, so I bought a few and made myself a cover for one.

I like to pull off a small sample of wool tops and staple it to the index card with the name of the shade or blend. I buy almost all of my supplies from World of Wool, but on the rare occasion I buy something elsewhere, I make a note of that too.

It’s really handy for natural wools too, the texture and staple length can be seen as well as the colour.

Do you have a system for storing your wools and fibres or keeping track if supplies are getting low? How about storage? I know that is always a favourite topic for fibre artists! 🙂

What I’ve been up to lately

February 10, 2012 shepherdessann Comments 18 comments

This week I started thinking about spring. It is coming, so to help throw off the February blahs I made some felt bird houses.

They are made form Romney wool. the original wool is a mix or white and brown that I dyed. you get a really nice variation in colour that way. These still need their strings to hand them up and I think the big one might end up as a squirrel house.

The other thing I did this week was get 2 new book cases to store wool on. I wanted to get all the dyed wool out so I could see it and get all the breed specific wool out so I could see what I have. I thought it would be lots of room but I still have a bin of mixed colours( not in the picture), I have my white and black wool in a bin each and that works fine and the Romney batts that are at least in a cupboard. I also have 8 or so bags of raw wool to be washed. I need to find a way to store the bin plus of yarn so I can see what I have. It’s just not working to have it all in bags inside a bin. I would like to get the over the door hangers that have all the little clear pockets for the yarn. I haven’t found them anywhere yet. Oh well it is better than it was so I will just have to be satisfied for the moment.