Nice plan Stan...... but ..... then ....

We all do this.... after the holidays we spend time reassembling the craft rooms.... putting products back where they belong.... or maybe moving things around and reorganizing.... and so it goes....  Well.... my PIC (stamping Partner In Crime) and I sold some of our destashed craft room items at a sale earlier in the Fall. My plan for this sale was if I sold enough items and made enough money my main purchase for my craft room would be the new Sizzix Big Shot machine. That was mainly all I had planned to buy as I was not sure how much $$ I would make at this sale.... Happy to say I did make enough money to buy my new Sizzix die cutting machine and here it is:

Very happy to have this machine in the craft room and it has gotten quite the work out with all the holiday projects I made for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas this past year.... I LOVE this machine! And I am happy to say I made more money at the sale than I thought I would so my second purchase was made.... 

Stopping this story here - Right after this sale I was on vacation from work.... Hubby attended a yearly swap meet he attends every year during this time and he is usually gone for that for a few days.... PERFECT timing I thought.... I can do my major overhaul in the craft room while he is gone with no interruptions so I can start this project and complete it and be done all BEFORE the holidays...... so before he left for his trip I had started moving things around in the craft room and re-using storage items that I no longer used for whatever.... I already had 2 of the IRIS rolling carts that hold 6 of their removable bins. I measured an area I wanted to move these to and decided I could use 2 more of the rolling carts for this space.... off to the internet to find the carts and at a good price..... Walmart came up with a cheaper price but I would have to wait for shipping and that could be another week.... wanting to keep this motivation going, and knowing I had one more week only of vacation, off to Amazon I went and happy me they were in stock, at a good price, and I would have them in 2 days.... great..... so hubby is gone and I am tearing things apart in the craft room and so it goes..... 

I took the items off the shelf I wanted to put the old and new Iris carts on and I took the wheels off the carts I already had and put these two carts on the shelf I wanted them on. So they are in place and next to them is the space for the two new rolling carts...... I am moving this here, that there, and making a list of all the things I want to move and re-organize once my two new rolling carts w bins arrive..... hubby arrives home late Saturday night from his trip.... it was not long before I knew we had problems -- I gave him a choice -- either he rides in the car for the trip to the hospital OR he can have an ambulance ride..... his choice... so off we go to the hospital in my car and long story - but all is well now -- right now he is on his riding mower while I am posting this -- anyways.... he was admitted through the ER to the hospital and he ended up in ICU for 7 days followed by 5 more days in another room..... needless to say I missed a few more weeks of work and all craft room projects were forgotten..... 

My two new Iris rolling carts arrived right after he went into the hospital and they spent some time by the front door as that is as far as I got them in the house when they came but at least they were here..... things settled down and I went back to work and after work and weekends I worked on holiday projects here and there and the holidays arrived..... of course spent a lot of time crafting in the craft room that was still pulled apart from last October but knew after Christmas I would be home from work on another vacation so plans in place to work on everything.... so all is good and hubby is fine and the holidays are over so before I go back to work.... it was now or never..... again...

Happy I was able to put the new Iris rolling carts (with no wheels on them) on the shelf I wanted them for and I am about half way or so through sorting and moving things into these bins. Here is a photo to show the 2 new Iris rolling bins I moved onto my shelf unit next to the two I already had:

With the four Iris carts in place I asked hubby to cut me a piece of plywood to put across the top of these four units. On top of this wood/carts I put four of the Sterlite 3 drawer organizers I already had in the craft room in another area holding other supplies. Right now on top of those is one extra Iris bin but not sure I will need them there for storage but for now that is where those are. I have labeled some of the bins that are filled and with the Iris 12 x 12 bins I can move those around on the cart/holder if I want but to start the first side I have card stock sorted and labeled:

I will keep the card stock on this end of these bin storage units as that is the best place for it for me to grab and use but everything else I have moved and labeled may not stay right where they are now but I am happy to say I can walk in the craft you with out having to step over everything that was waiting for their new homes in these bins..... As you can see in each bin there is a piece of manila folder in the front of each of the bins . . . there is two reasons for this - #1  I have pot lights in the craft room and a window and I do not want any of the cardstock to fade and #2  to me it looks more uniform to see the piece of manila folder in the front of the bins than to see all the different stuff in each bin. Before I started this reorganizing project back in the Fall I had gone to a thrift store (ScrapExchange in Durham) and I picked up a big stack of new legal sized manila folders. I used them for the strips in front of all the bins and drawers and I also planned to make dividers for my second big project I had planned..... 

I have a metal shelf in the craft room and it holds a lot of things but it never looked like it was used for the best of organization of craft room products. I took everything off of that and with me moving things around in the craft room I had empty white plastic baskets from Hobby Lobby that I had stamp sets in, die sets in, trims in, etc.... once I had done my destash for the sale last Fall and with moving things around I had enough of these baskets to jump into my next project.... GOAL??? Being able to find things easily from the same manufacturer..... This was esp important since some of the companies I bought from are no longer around -- Impression Obession and MFT - My Favorite Things..... but again NOT wanting to spend more $$ to do this than I already have having bought the two new Iris rolling carts with bins..... so recycling/reusing storage items was the key....

Here is a photo of my almost completed metal shelf now:

Some of the companies I have on this shelf I only have a few products from like PixiDust or Gina K or Kristina Werner. To start the first bin I did was Impression Obsession / IO Stamps:

Used an empty fridge bin from destashed products for this company and it is filled with dies. Here is a better photo of this sorted bin:

When I did the destashing for the Fall sale I sold items at I had bought small plastic bags from Amazon to put items in and I used the extra bags for this project as these bags zip closed so I do not have to use magnet sheets. This makes sorting items cheaper and certainly much lighter by skipping the magnet sheets. For my dividers I used the We R Memory Keepers Tab Punch Board and some of the manila folders I picked up at the thrift store and my label maker. SOOOO happy to have this done... and motivation was high once this was done so over three days I kept it going.... did all the tabs and organizing for Taylored Expressions, PixiDust, SimonSaysStamp, Jaded Blossom, and so on:

I had started doing this with a few of these companies before I moved everything to the same shelf so the biggest ones I had to do was IO Stamps/Taylored Expressions/HoneyBee Stamps. Happy to use the white baskets again and all baskets are labeled and that label is held in place using a binder clip. Below these white baskets are my Christmas dies and also background stamps. Those were already sorted and dividers had been made for them long ago so I just had to move them all to this shelf unit and this is a long time coming in finishing that project but certainly glad I did get it done!!

As usual with a craft room things always are in the wrong place until you reorganize and move them to their new place which soon can become the wrong place again .... but I will say this is all such an improvement and it is all falling into place now so that is a good thing for this craft room for sure and I am happy I have had time off to finish this all since it was started so long ago.... 

Still putting things away in their new homes but certainly a vast improvement having things finished that were started in the Fall and things put together with other like things.... ALWAYS nice to be able to find the products we bought and could not wait until they arrived!! not to mention being able to walk in the craft room again -- hahaha.....