Time to Update

I am sharing my previous sewing room so you can see the transformation. Although the old sewing room was very funtional and somewhat appealing in appearance, it was not the most useful in organization nor modern. So with my endeavors to move on with my goals of increasing my client base and growing to supplement our new phase of life, RETIREMENT, I must update. I had to remove the carpet and we refinished the existing floors we had underneath our carpet for over 50 years.  The floors are so beautiful now, but that will be another posting. 

My husband and I are working to make supplemental income to compensate the increasing cost of health care. He works for the private sector, so we will be having to pay out of pocket for his health coverage. Mine will be covered, but we all know with any pre-existing health issues and of course age, the cost of good medical coverage is on the rise, and not going to get any better. I LOVE to sew and have had some very fun and challenging clients to build my expertise and confidence to move on and challenge a growing business of not only alterations, but also dressmaking and tailoring. I have been sewing for over 40 years and making my own wardrobe for years, as well as for others from time to time. Where I have had the opportunity to grow is with tailoring and making some very interesting and fun designer garments from just pictures. It brings me so much inner contentment and happiness, I figured I might as well use it to see if I can aid in supplementing our meager retirement income in the upcoming few years.

 The biggest storage area I had was an open closet with shelves, many of them stationery unable to adjust.  And as you can see, I also used this area as a display for the jewelry I design along with garments.

To the right is the organizing unit I purchased at Walmart to store all of my jewelry making supplies with as much asthetics as possible for the cost.  Each little cubicle was stuffed to the brim with storage containers that fit perfectly inside each one, allowing me to pull out just the containers I need.

This is another storage unit I found at a garage sale, utilized for storing fabric & serger threads.  The foot stool actually is for my makeup vanity I found on the side of the road someone was throwing out.  It was vintage painted white about 50 times and the drawers were painted shut.  So needless to say it took alot of elbow grease and loving care to restore.  I ran out of time and finished up after stripping it, and just painted it brown, but this summer my goal is to strip it again and really restore it to the original finish.

You can see the vanity in it's almost finished mode from stripping, it is so vintage and I LOVE it.  I have wanted one like this since I was a small girl, a childhood friend had one, and I envied her so much, so I am enjoying mine I found just by fluke.  The storage rack for hanging garments I purchased also at Walmart to accomodate cllient's garments coming in & out, along with my current projects for myself.  All of these self fix methods to store are actually making my room more disorganized than anything.

This is my actual sewing desk and really it is a desk I had used in the office my husband & I share.  But when my daughter moved out, I moved in making it my sewing room finally.  The sewing maching is a Brother Duetta Embroidery combination, and my husband just purchased for me a new Babylock Serger with the air push self threader.  And by the way the Brother also has a self threading mechanism that just makes changing threads while emboidering so easy and effortless.

But coming soon will be the updated pics from the finished sewing room, and I will honor not only all the women who have their own blogs and inspired me to utilize some of their useful tools but also my son & husband who worked so hard to make my dream sewing room so possible.  I not only have the necessary hidden storage I needed but also the little nooks and cranies to fill even the littlest storage problems.

 

I also will be adding some pictures soon of our new and updated floors and what changes it made to the inside of our home.  We finally will have a home to never be ashamed of having guests invited into.  We have had such a year with my husbands three surgeries back to back and all the renovations at the same time.  But also my daughter who suffers from epilepsy from a childhood bacterial meningitis illness, had her first baby.  She had some complications throughout the pregnancy which meant ongoing support.  But we have a gorgeous grandson, Isaiah, who is the happiest little bundle of sunshine for us all.  He brings so much joy, beyond what I could have imagined.