Neatness Counts

Sorry I've been blogAWOL,
life intervenes sometimes, doesn't it?! Between trying to not spend so much of my time on the computer, (a good thing, I've gotten so much done in the studio!) and teenager issues which involved a trip to the doctor for stitches, sigh(yes I was warned it was going to be tough, but I didn't know until I'd experienced it myself), the blogging just fell by the wayside.

Anyways! Moving on! (as Stephen Colbert would say)...

Turns out that one of the biggest things holding me back from getting anything done was my messy worktable. (see picture above).
I came to this conclusion as part of the work I'm doing in my mentoring class Creative Sparks with Gabrielle Swain.
She basically asked us to look around in our lives and figure out what is stopping us from getting going on making, doing, creating. And so I walked into my studio and thought to myself:
"Ok, what is it in here that makes me just do a u-turn and go read more books, magazines, blogs, watch movies, go outside, even, gasp! do the dishes instead of sit down at my worktable and **begin**.

And the number one thing was the messy surface. I couldn't see a place to start. Because there wasn't one. There was no space, too much besides just tools was out and taking up real estate on top of my worktable.
So I took a few minutes and cleaned up, I moved the scrap bag off and under the table, I emptied out the baskets, stowed away the projects in their designated boxes.
Now the only five things remaining are:

1. the cutting mat,
2. rulers/rotary cutter in the corner,
3. basket for scraps (which now gets emptied into my scrap tub under the table),
4. my thread jar (where all the threads, and broken needles go until I make them into witch balls, I find it visually exciting and inspiring so it got to stay.)
5. And one little wooden tray which currently holds the charm patches I'm cutting for J and myself as I go.

Seems too Simple huh?

Now my routine is when I'm done for the day I just tidy up after myself. So that the space is ready for me the next day. Geez, I know this is completely simple, and I don't know what it was that finally made this click in. But I sure am grateful and glad that it works for me! I used to scoff at those that kept hyper-neat spaces, seemed like a waste of time that could be spent creatively. Turns out, once I'm beginning with a clean space that it isn't really a lot of time to keep it that way. d'oh!

Times up, I'll share some of my work *output* with you tomorrow!