Approaching my studio

want to stop and swing awhile?

the front room

this is what you see when you walk in the door. You can just see part of my desk. I had to finally set up a desk to handle all the paperwork over in the Studio. I gave up trying to do it in my house. It seemed like my papers were all over the place. I have a TV to provide background noise, because I rarely watch a show! A comfy couch to sit on when I get tired.

My desk from a bird's eye view

I finally got a laptop to work on , an inexpensive printer and a file cabinet to maybe corral all those papers!

The bathroom

walking down the hall from the front room, you can peek in the bathroom but you can't see the toilet, shower or sink from this picture. The quilt on the wall is better to look at anyway!

The kitchen

continuing on down the hall, you come to the kitchen. Not the biggest one in the world, but it does have everything we need when I have retreats. I love how I can use a whole different decorating theme here that I probably wouldn't do in my main house.

my personal sewing room

This is to the left when you come in the front door. It used to be one of the double deep garages, but my husband had converted it to a master bedroom.

My first NICE machine

don't get me wrong, I had other good machines, but hubby decided that I really needed a good machine. I love my Pfaff--it's my go-to machine for all my piecing duties. And of course straight machine quilting.

My Bernina

wondering what all the fuss was about, I bought her a few years ago. I love the blanket stitch on this machine and loved the way it handled while doing free motion quilting. She doesn't get to do that much anymore...you'll see why in a minute..

the far end of my room

this is what I see when I sit at my machine..my big work table (4 1/2 feet by 8 ft) with the ironing center in front of it. The pink wall is my walk in closet that hubby built floor to ceiling shelves for all my stash. Sad to say it still isn't big enough. I would open the door and show you, but it looks like there was a mini fabric explosion in there. So, one day, when I'm bored or finally fed up that I can't find anything again, I'll stop and re-organize and take a picture. in the meantime, use your imagination!

the scrap bins

this used to be where I put all my scraps, depending on color. One for reds/pinks, blacks/browns/yellows, blues, greens, (the missing one is full of neutrals), and then had to add 2 for brights. I now have drawer carts for different size strips--one cart with 5 drawers for brights only and the other cart for all the rest! They just don't play as nicely together as I would like and finally had to seperate the two!

my embroidery center

this is kind of new and so am making due with what furniture I had. I am thinking of how I need to have this area set up and more organized.

view of my sewing room

while standing in the back. I have a beautiful bay window that I can see out while sewing. What you really can't see on the left is my design wall. What did I ever do without that?

the other side of the work table

these bins are all full of UFO's and projects in process. I tried not to start any more than it would hold, but notice the 4 bins in front of the cubbies? tsk, tsk, to me! My stereo and loads of CD's are in this corner too. I have all sorts of music, depending on my mood.

my ironing center

this is the very first thing my hubby built for me to try and tame my stash. It used to hold ALL my stash! now it just gets the primo stuff--fabric collections, my hand dyeds that I did, fabrics that I want to keep together. I loved the big 2'x6' ironing area it gave me. I vowed I would always keep this clear of stuff--I try very hard-but it's so handy to put things on! Looks like a new cover is needed.

heading up the stairs..

the top of the stairs

My HQ16, aka "Zoe", resides at the large landing area at the top of the stairs. We still need to add full spectrum lights to this area. I can roll her out to machine quilt and then roll her back under the slanted ceilings to get her out of the way.

Zoe

pretty thing, isn't she?

view of the classroom from the doorway

I just had an Open House for classes, so all the sewing machines are put away. I have 8 machines that students can use.

the massage room

My massage therapist uses this space for an occasional client that doesn't want her coming to their home. She also comes to my retreats and does wonderful massages on our last day.