The rest of the story!

Happy weekend!  It's the end of the week, and without further ado I now bring you...the rest of my closet!  I hope you've enjoyed this peek into my new craft/sewing space.  I am so excited to have a dedicated place for storage and most important of all, a place where my sewing machine can set out and not have to be taken off the dining room table every time my family wants to eat!

Next to my new bookcase is my sewing table with my Ott craft light.  I already had the bulletin board, which I covered in fancy paper and tacked up a few words of encouragement.  I had bought the fabric on the sewing table last summer, intending to make a pillow for one of our outside garden chairs but it was the perfect color to blend with both the closet and my new sewing machine and was just the right size to cover the table.  The sewing table had been discarded at work, and is just the right size as there is room to work on other crafts if I move the sewing machine to the back of the table. 

Do you like my new machine?!  I think I will, but (true confession time) I haven't tried it out yet.  This is in spite of the fact that it is a year and a half old!  I was recovering from major surgery and ended up one day alone in the house, reclining on the sofa and idly flipping through television channels.  I landed on the Home Shopping Network channel, which I had never seen before.  Moral of the story...don't watch HSN when you are on painkillers!  EVERYTHING LOOKS AMAZING!  One week later, a big box with this machine in it arrived on my doorstep.  Of course by then I wasn't drugged and was more than a little embarrassed by my out of character impulsive purchase! 

However, it is a Singer and my old Singer has lasted me through the first thirty years of marriage, so I'm trusting this one will get me through the next thirty years!  But when I first took it out of the box and started reading the instruction manual, it seemed a little daunting, so back in the box it went, waiting for a time when I had space to sew.  I guess that time has arrived, so wish me luck as I play with my new toy!  If I can figure out how to do a fifth of what this machine promises I will be really excited.  It has 310 built in stitches and more than 1,000 stitch functions, an automatic needle threader and a top drop-in bobbin plus a whole lot more.  I am determined to conquer the manual and start using this machine!

I splurged on one little treat for the closet--this lovely 'window' hanging from Michael's. It was on sale for 50% off and it was so pretty I couldn't resist it.  It ties in all the greens, purples and blues in the room, and I especially loved the unexpected word 'entrepreneur' up in the right hand corner.  It seemed like it was offering me encouragement to move forward with my cross stitch pattern ideas.

Here is the breakdown for my new closet: paint $14; new bookcase $22; vinyl floral decals $12; owl vase $7; contact paper, plastic bins and magazine holders $28 (who knew plain old magazine holders were so expensive?!  If I had been more creative I could have made them out of cereal boxes and covered them with my left over contact paper); papers for bookcase and bulletin board $8; and wall hanging $32.  $123 total for a complete closet makeover.  Not bad!  I budgeted $100, but once I had seen the wall hanging I knew it belonged in this space.

So here it is, my new creativity closet!  I hope you have enjoyed watching the transformation.  Now the last question is...which project do I start first?!

Have a wonderful weekend!  I'll be back tomorrow with my link to Mockingbird Hill Cottage's Favorite Thing Saturday.