The Great Fabric Sort Out

Inspired by watching the last episode of a series about compulsive obsessive hoarders and cleaners, and due to the fact that, as I may have mentioned before,  I have a ridiculous amount of fabric tucked away in various places in our house, I set about sorting some more of it out this week.  Most of it had been organised and placed in storage boxes in my workroom, when it was finally finished, but there was still one corner that I hadn't managed to tackle, so I set about doing just that.

In the corner of the living room, I had a blanket box packed full of fabric, wool and various other bits and pieces.  With a couple of hours to spare one day, I went through it and pulled out all of it's contents, sorting them into different piles. 

There was a pile of fabric I no longer wanted, some I had already used for small projects and others I  could not imagine making into anything whatsoever.  This will be bagged up and sent off to a charity shop in the near future.  Hopefully someone will be able to make good use of it.  There was a pile to sell on ebay.  This only had one item in it.  There was a pile of various bits and pieces to be relocated to the workroom.   There was a pile of fabrics that I wanted to make into clothes or utilise for other projects.  This pile was quite big and was later dutifully carried upstairs and is now sat in the workroom waiting for work to begin.  Finally, there was a last pile, which were fabrics that I liked, but couldn't think of an immediate use for, so these went back in the blanket box.  The box itself, however, had half as much inside it once I'd finished, which is a kind of progress.

The pile of fabric transferred to the workroom awaiting transformation looks like this. As you can see there are quite a number of different fabrics in the pile of varying size and composition. The fabrics  types range from cotton, polyester, needlecord, cotton lawn  to cotton sateen, stretch cotton, jersey, etc.  Some I find more challenging to work with than others, and some will definitely require me to get my overlocker working properly to finish edges and prevent fraying.

To start the ball rolling, later the same day, I went through my patterns again to try to match up fabrics with patterns and I managed to figure out a potential use for quite a few of the fabrics.   I did make a start tonight, by making a rayon scarf out of an old vintage fabric and I also prepared a couple more pieces of fabric to be made into scarves too.   I then cut out one paper pattern in readiness for my next project which is a skirt (again), but from a pattern I haven't yet used, which is always quite exciting.

From the rest of the pile I intend to make a dress or possibly two, another skirt or two, at least one top, a beanbag and a cushion cover for my daughter's bedroom.  I think that is plenty to be going on with.

I will feel a great sense of satisfaction when I finally take the fabric I no longer want and some other items currently clogging up the top of the linen cupboard on the landing, to the charity shop, and I hope that they will make some money from it.  Here's a picture of the things that need to be given away.  I'll try to take them next week as this will create some room for moving things from the dining room to a temporary place whilst we have family staying.  Sometimes life is like a game of musical chairs, moving things from one place to another before finding just the right spot.