My Crafty Space & Storage ideas

Welcome to my Crafty area, here are some of my storage solutions and helpful hints and tips that I have discovered whilst i have been crafting, these ideas may not be original but they help me and maybe will give you an idea or two. I want to Thank all the wonderful crafter's out there that share their knowledge and helpful hints, tips and tutorials. 

For a couple of years like many I crafted on the dining room table, so after every crafting session I had to tidy away what I was doing, I had various plastic sets of draws and a bookcase for storage so have been desperate for my own space for ages.

So when my son went away to university we discussed with him about me sharing his room, as he is hardly here (holidays only Now :-( )

My sister in-law (who was having her house re-modelled) offered us her old kitchen cupboards, I was a bit apprehensive how they would look but my wonderful hubby did an excellent job and adjusted the cupboards to fit along one wall of the room. I wanted all the craft stuff to be able to be put away when son comes home so he has his bedroom back ‘almost’ and I can honestly say it works really well, so here are a few piccys of my space.

This is an open corner cupboard which is the perfect size for 6x6 paper pads

Copic/Pro-marker Storage

This started life as a CD holder and hubby used some mounting board to create separate compartments so I can store them in their colour families.

 

Due to my ill-health I spend a lot (too much) time in bed and I sometimes want to colour so hubby transfers all my markers into this Kitchen caddy and I can have my markers in whatever room I am in.

My Pro-markers have little coloured dots on the ends so I can see what colour they are, these were created by using a standard hole punch and punching out lots of holes in my stamping card, and then colouring them in and sticking them with PVA glue to the caps – very time consuming and I have now seen you can buy ‘EndDots’ from Letraset very cheaply and I would have bought these had I seen them! 

 My Stickle Storage

A visit to B&Q, and a rummage through their wood box, that holds all the odd ends of wood that they sell off cheaply and hubby found the perfect piece of wood, It cost £1 and at home after finding the correct sized drill bit, he drilled 45 holes into it, it fits into my craft cupboard perfectly and it now is my perfect stickle, liquid pearls, and anything else that comes in a similar sized bottle storage, and I have lots of room for more.

Spellbinders Die Storage

I use Old DVD Cases to store my dies in.

As you can see I have two strips of Magnetic tape stuck on the inside of the case and the sets of dies ‘stick’ to this so aren’t loose, so don’t get lost, and then on the outside of the case I have used copy paper, printed the name of the die set, and a layered the shape (square in this case) and also included the sizes of the dies, to show me what’s in each DVD case –Having the layered shape also helps me know/notice if there is one missing, the larger rectangle and label dies fit in them and they stack nicely in the cupboard with easy to read labels on the spines.

Colouring Tip/Hints/Help Book

This is the best hint/tip that I could give to any marker user. I have a book that I write down all my favourite colour combo’s, ideas hints and tips. I record all the details of every new image that I colour, I also write down other people’s tips and what colour combos they recommend.  I have lists of hair colour combo’s and skin tone combo’s, all sorts of tips and helpful hints and tutorials that I have found since using markers, basically it just saves me wasting card and ink and time and effort, This works well for me and is so helpful, it has all sorts written in and stuck in and I would recommend this to anyone who colours whatever medium you use.   

    

Un-mounted Stamp Storage

This is very simple but effective. I try to keep all the stamps from the same company together,  so I stamp images onto white/cream card, I then laminate the card and the stamps will ‘cling’ to the laminated card and then I store them in a normal A4 folders, in clear page protectors.

 

Inspirational Sketch Book designed by clever crafters!

Another helpful book that is always on my desk is my ‘Sketch Book’. I save and print out all the brilliant sketches that I find on websites/blogs or from magazines, then stick them into a this book.

In hindsight, I should have printed the sketches much smaller and kept a better record of where they came from and who designed them, and the date I found/printed it, but whenever my mojo is hiding, I look through my book of ‘inspirational sketches’ and I can always find one that suits the situation.

I hope you have enjoyed your visit and hope that you have seen something that will be of help to you.

Lou xxx