Overwhelmed no more

I have been on a mission for the last year - to clean out the massive quantities of stuff in my basement.  Some of it has been remainders of inventory from the (now closed) salvage studio retail space.  Some of it has been raw materials for projects.  Some of it has been projects in process.  And some of it was just detritus that had to be tossed.  I've been making good progress on most of it.  But the albatross that lurked in the back of my studio still remained...
18 plastic tubs of fabric.

As I've commented before, I have been sewing since I was a little girl.  At one time, I made most of my clothes.  When I started my company, four corners design, I made pillows, tablecloths and bed linens from a combination of vintage and recycled fabrics.  So over the years, one accumulates a lot of fabric...because you never know when you will need just that right texture/color/pattern for whatever it is that you are making.

I've stopped making my clothes - I pretty much wear blue jeans, gray t-shirts and wool sweaters now.  I stopped making pillows from vintage textiles - people would love the design but would prefer, for example, that the fabric to be red and not blue- they did not understand that with vintage materials, its one-of-a-kind.  And whenever I was working on a project and wanted to add some fabric, I could never find what I was looking for because there's so much and its so disorganized - to say nothing about rummaging thru 18 tubs and finding the desired fabric in the last tub!

Last year I heard about this "purge party" happening in Seattle - it was too late for me to participate but when I got the early info in January, I immediately signed up.  There's a group of Stashaholics, a fabric swap community, that sponsors a "Purge Party" twice a year at Magnuson Park.  Its a place to unload your stash (and earn a commission on your sales) or you can load up on more stash by coming to the sale.  This spring sale will be April 10 & 11.  All the details can be found on their website, Our Fabric Stash.  One could even sell their stash and also buy more but I'm going to resist and just unload.  And its not just fabric - textiles, yarn, notions, craft supplies will all be for sale.  I also love the part that whatever you don't sell, you can choose to donate and the Stashaholics will take care of giving it to a charitable cause.

So I'm going thru my 18 tubs and have it whittled down to 4 tubs that I'm keeping.  These rest went to Goodwill or is being tagged for the Purge Party.  I have a lot of fabric remnants - I organized them by color and have bundled them together so you get a coordinated package of material - perfect for making a quilt, a totebag, sachets, whatever you want. 













I have 75 bundles - many have vintage materials and designer fabrics in them - don't you need one for yourself?