Organization: Mini Fabric Bolts

Lately my fabric has gotten kinda outta control.  It used to be neatly stored in those Rubbermaid 3 drawer carts (and a huge cardboard box next to them).  Then it exploded and was taking over the entire downstairs.  While browsing the web and my crafting forums I happened across several references to "mini-bolts" of fabric. What are mini-bolts exactly?  They are ridiculously adorable baby bolts of fabric.  Someone somewhere at some point in time had the genius idea to take comic book boards and use them to wrap their fabric around, making a mini-bolt of fabric.  These ones are 6.75 by 10.5 inches, some out there are 8.5 by 11 inches, and there are other sizes as well.

I hate ordering things online though, because then I have to WAIT for them to arrive.  I'm an instant gratification kinda girl. In my internet perusing I saw several people say they used regular old foam-core board (the kind you get by the poster board).  I decided that's the method I would take because then I could run out and get them and get started on my reorganization RIGHT THEN. So I did.  I picked up four boards, they were 20x30 inches.  I cut each board into 8 pieces, measuring 7.5 by 10 inches.

To wrap my fabric around the mini-bolt I laid it out and folded it selvedge to selvedge (the way it comes on the bolt at the store). Then I fold it into thirds so it is just a little bit shorter than the mini-bolt.  Place the piece of foam-core at one end and roll the fabric around it.  Use a pin to secure the end when you're finished.  VOILA adorable baby bolt. I've spent the past week or so (on and off) doing this to all my fabric.  Then yesterday I went and picked up one of those 9 cube storage things. Unfortunately it wouldn't fit downstairs with the rest of my sewing stuff, so I did some rearranging and now it happily resides in my bedroom closet where I can admire it before bed. 



ugh.  Isn't that just beautiful?  Looking at it just fills me with happy.  My fabric is all nice and displayed, I can see what I have and can easily pick and pair combos.  and its just so gorgeous! I'm in love.  Seriously.  My impatience definitely paid off though.  If I had been willing to wait and ordered comic book boards, they wouldn't have fit on the shelves.  These however fit PERFECTLY.  I have wanted one of these 9 cube storage shelves for an eternity but was never sure what I would do with them.  Now I have one and the perfect use for it, and have I mentioned how wonderful it looks?  I just love the sight of all my fabric displayed in such a neat and organized fashion.

 Mini-bolts of fabric=WIN.

Now I just need to figure out what to do with my fat quarters and scraps.

Crunchy FAILS

I'm a little heartbroken about this post.  I love sharing and promoting "green", "crunchy" choices.  But I feel its only fair to share when those choices don't necessarily work out. 

My first crunchy fail is my garden.
 
Isn't that heartbreaking?  Those sad wilted lettuce leaves.  The dried up and droopy tomato and cucumber sprouts.  And where is the strawberry plant you may ask?  It disappeared.  The plants were sitting on the deck getting some sun, and when I went to get them the strawberry plant was just gone.  I couldn't find it. Disappeared.  So we thought.  A few days after this picture my mom found it.  It had fallen off the deck and was hiding under something.  But its in pretty sorry shape too. 

I didn't manage to get them transplanted into bigger containers fast enough.  Their roots were stunted and died.  I'd think about doing it, but whenever I thought about doing it the weather would be all cloudy and rainy.  And then on sunshiny days I'd be too distracted playing with my kiddo until it was either too late to do it or it was time for me to go to class.  So they died. The lettuce actually has some new baby leafs so it might be salvageable.  I'm not so confident with the others.  Next Saturday Market though I'm going to pick up some new plants and they will be transplanted right away.  Maybe they'll actually live longer than a couple weeks.

My second crunchy fail would be the Oil Cleansing Method.  It is essentially No Poo, for your face.  Using oil to clean your face instead of commercial face washes that over-dry your skin and have all sorts of nasty chemicals in em.  Sounds great and I was excited to try it.  Read a bunch online about it, tons of rave reviews, some troubleshooting. So I started and it was great at first. I broke out at first but that was part of the expected detox.  Then the breakouts didn't go away, and more sprung up.  The worse part was I got tons of little bumps all over my forehead.  I figured I was doing something wrong so I read more online, thought I found the solutions and gave it another couple weeks for the previous breakouts to clear up.  Except that didn't happen.  Instead I started getting the little bumps on the sides of my face.  So I threw in the towel. I hope to try again in the future, maybe try different oils or be more consistent with it.  We'll see. 

This is a two level fail though.  When I went to buy some face wash to use I happened across this natural face wash at Safeway called In-Kind.  No parabens, sulfates, pesticides, or other gross stuff in it.  And it smells FANTASTIC.  So I grabbed that and the In-Kind moisturizer.  I only used it twice though, because my skin still felt greasy after I used it.  Its probably not really fair to label it a fail, seeing as I only used it twice though.  But, I don't really feel like dealing with a greasy feeling face, so we're putting it on a shelf until my skin has a chance to level out. 

Instead, I'm going to try doing just a baking soda wash.  I figured if the baking soda is good for taking care of the oils in my hair, it should take care of the oils on my face as well.  I looked some stuff up online and found that a bunch of other people use baking soda as a face wash and get great results.  So thats what I'm trying, here's hoping it works out better than OCM did!

Neglected.

I've got a confession to make. 

With all the sewing I do, my poor niece and nephew have been terribly neglected and suffered from a terrible lack of handmade auntie goods. 

Until recently that is.  I've been sewing little things here and there for them for months, and then finally at the end of April I got my butt in gear and had a week-long sew-a-thon. 

 
The products of that sewing.

I've been wanting to post this for awhile, but I had to wait til they got it, and then I just kept forgetting.  They got it the other week, and here are a couple action pics, just because I've got the cutest niece and nephew in the whole wide world.

 

Oh, and does this look familiar to anyone?
 
Let me refresh your memory.....

(from the post Cousins.)