I’ve had a few disturbed nights recently as I’m changing over medication, so rather than sitting feeling sorry for myself I’ve pottered in my sewing room, nibbling away at the Sewing Room Declutter Challenge, 21 days of sorting and tidying!

Day 10 was pins and needles. I have all sorts of different pins and needles, different ones for different types of sewing, embroidery ones, machine ones, quilting ones…and lots of types within each area. Luckily I do have a sort of system to try and keep order!

Machine needles are in a labelled box in the top drawer next to my sewing machine, I bought it from Pattern Trace and I do like it, you may have spotted it in a photo when I was sorting threads. I can easily see what kinds of needles I have in stock, there’s a little bit of velcro in each compartment too to put a used needle on.

The purple needlecase also just in the photo is where I keep different types of hand sewing needles. I made it a couple of years ago, I have a different felt page for beading, cross-stitch, embroidery, general sewing and specialist ones such as curved needles.

For pins I have two large pincushions, Mary the Hippo and Scottie the dog, they both started life as a soft toy entry in Otley show. I have one on my cutting out table and one next to my sewing machine. I like them as they are so big I don’t have to concentrate where I’m stabbing the pin! The pins move from one to the other, I use the pins on the cutting out table and then whilst I’m sewing they gradually get stuck in the sewing machine one, when one fills up I swap them round.

Spare hand needles tend at the moment to be stuck in either one but at the top of the head – I can’t quite bring myself to stick pins on their faces!!I do have plans for a third ‘pin-cushion’ which will just be for needles, seen as I fell for a kit at the Knitting and Stitching show last November – well it’s a sewing machine shape!

Day 11 was measuring and cutting stuff, rulers, tape measures, boards…

I had a little clear out of tape measures I didn’t like a month or so back, I still have four which may seem a little excessive, but if I throw some out I’m bound to accidently cut through one the following week! I did check their measurements as tape measures do stretch or might not be that accurate, but all mine passed that test. They all hang on my pegboard, they are much better behaved since I moved my sewing room round, they used to take every opportunity to slither down the gap behind my sewing table, lying there like a tangle of snakes!!

Large quilting rulers are also hung on my pegboard where they’re easy to reach but safe from breaking. Small rulers are in another drawer unit by Creations by Rod on ebay. As well as the embroidery bobbin drawers I also asked him to make me one with shallow drawers. This is actually the basic drawer unit for knitting needles, it’s deeper than the others, being the full depth of the Ikea unit. I asked Rod to make it without any inserts, so just eight shallow drawers. I have one with dies in on magnetic sheets, one with quilting templates, another with triangular rulers, one with those free motion quilting rulers, another with rotary cutters, one with boards such as an A4 fixed blade cutting board and one with all my standard quilting rulers! It’s conveniently positioned under my cutting table so everything is handy.

My most commonly used rulers are the 6.5″ square and the 9 x 6″, in fact when I checked them over I decided that a new 6.5″ one might be a good idea with a Hobbycraft voucher I’ve just received as mine is pretty chipped in the most used corner. I also have a 1/4″ ruler, a 2″ ruler and a 4.5″ square…I could slim down some of the contents of these drawers, but they all fit nicely into the drawers so I may as well keep them for now.

I’m now over half way through the declutter challenge, though it’s taking me a lot more than 21 days!!