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Originally uploaded by theartofmegan

It isn't pretty. It's actually kinda gross. And when you're working out of a small office that the two of you share, it becomes a disaster area. Kind of frightening and pretty dangerous.

This is what my floor looked like before I decided to put in a system. A plan is what i needed, for sure. Originally, all my fabric was folded semi-neatly and stuffed into a big plastic tub. That was all well and good until I needed to look for something. Then everything that was nice and neat was dug through, and nothing was so neat anymore.

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Originally uploaded by theartofmegan

Here was my original solution to the rubber bin situation. Granted, the concept was a good one and the fabric was more organized with this method than before. However, even though this was a prettier solution since I could color-coordinate my fabrics, it had two downfalls.

First, hanging shelves go in the closet. Great if your hall closet isn't stacked waist-high like mine is right now. (Hey, moving from a 3 bedroom house with a garage to a 2 bedroom apartment ain't easy!)
Secondly, as you can see, this just becomes a more evolved version of the fold-and-stuff method, in the long run. Not exactly what I'm going for.

This is when I decided to just change it!

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Originally uploaded by theartofmegan

So when I decided to change my fabric storage, I started eyeballing the shelves I had in the office. Now, I'm no neat freak by any means, but these things had just become a big fat mess and I didn't like it anymore. It was time to start over.

I began by cleaning off the top two shelves on either side, and slowly breaking down all the supplies into less bins. Any loose supplies were either put away or found a permanent home elsewhere.

I also purchased more individual bead organizers and got my huuuge mess of bead goodies sorted and organized. (Man, that project made me feel a little OCD)

Then, I purchased a box of chipboard comic book boards online, and patiently awaited a chance to start wrapping.

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Originally uploaded by theartofmegan

I found this method so exciting when I first saw it here:

Fabric Wrapped Around Boards

I saw several people have lots of success with it on Craftster.org, so I decided to give it a try myself. Here's a small pile of the starting fabrics I wrapped.

Basically, this method uses comic book boards, usually made of chipboard, as a sturdy form to wrap fabric yardages around. A fat quarter neatly wraps around, and I have up to around 4 yards wrapped nice and smooth.

I fold my fabric first, to ensure a large enough piece to wrap around the board a few times, but small enough to manage and control neatly.

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Originally uploaded by theartofmegan

So here it is. The left side of the new wrapped fabric storage.

I really enjoy that I can see every piece of fabric I have. It makes me aware of what I have in my stash, so I'm less likely to just buy fabric at random and end up with something verrry similar to what I may already be storing.

Also, looking at all these great fabrics inspires me to actually want to do more sewing, which both gives me a reason to use up fabric, and also allows me to buy new fabric every so often and not have it end up in a pile or stuffed into a shelf as storage.

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Originally uploaded by theartofmegan

So isn't it nice to make a difference in your own life by putting some organization into it all? Using craft supplies as decor makes a lot of sense to me. If I'm looking at it all the time, I'm much more likely to decide to use it more often.

I love crafting, but I also have this problem with hoarding supplies. Fabric is my greatest downfall in this department. Heck, I just spent $50 on a big box of jersey knits, AFTER I organized all this stuff. But what can I say, a deal of 3 dollars or less a yard is hard to pass up sometimes!

Well, at least when it shows up I know exactly where I'll be putting it!