Wednesday, February 11, 2009

An Organized Stash

I have limited space in the house for my fiber stash, and last year purchased a small storage shed to put in the backyard. I shoved boxes of stuff in there, but found the result unsatisfying for a variety of reasons - first, it didn't look very nice, and second, I found some spiders in there - I figure if spiders can find their way inside, so can some other bugs. I contemplated renting a storage unit, but those are expensive here in San Diego. It dawned on me that if I transferred stuff to clear plastic storage bins, my stash might be safe in the storage shed.

So... I purchased a bunch of bins at Target on Sunday. Unfortunately, I eyeballed the lids rather than trying them, and... you guessed it ... I had the wrong lids. We had torrential downpours on Monday, so yesterday I went and exchanged the lids for the correct ones.

I printed labels for each bin and put them in page protectors and tucked them in the sides of the bins. Since we're expecting more rain tomorrow, I decided today was the day to clear out the junk stored in the shed, and move my bins in. I'm exhausted, but got it done! Here you can see stacks of bins with spinning fibers and weaving yarns.


And here you can see the stack of bins with knitting yarns.

This means that next time I'm looking for a specific item from my stash, I should be able to find it fairly quickly, and it should be pretty safe in the shed. Luckily, I don't have a lot of wool, but I do plan to check from time to time and see if my scheme is working, and if not, move the wool out.

It's amazing how much energy getting organized frees up!

2 comments:

Sara said...

Fabulous! Now, when I *need* something, I can just go to your garden shed and you have the bins all nicely marked for me!

There is that small detail of the 8 hour drive there and 8 hours back.....

Good work :)

Deanna said...

Pop on down anytime. I didn't realize you are only 8 hours away, I may need to pop on up sometime. :-)

I'd like the bins better if they were lining a yurt, but I'm glad for them now, and hey, some of them have some space available, which gives me permission to buy a bit more, eh?!