Organizing Patterns and Fabrics

This winter my mother and I received a gift from one of her quilting friends: a big bag of patterns.  After wading through the wonderfulness of all of the patterns I pulled out the ones I'd like to keep and brought some of them home with me.

adult patterns

Mom and I have decided to share the patterns back and forth; it just seems to make more sense this way.

kid patterns

I was actually thinking it would be good for us to share *all* of our patterns, not just the 'new' ones we just got.

 

patterns my husband gave me last year

So I started getting them all organized so I know what I have and can catalog them somehow. (anyone want to gift us a copy of MS Access?)  I used to have all of them very well organized, but after several years, a lot of sewing, and two moves they were all mixed up and in boxes and bags in various locations in the apartment.

omg so many patterns

The box above just has the Simplicity and McCall/ McCall's patterns, but at least now they are in numerical order

shameful

But then there is this growing pile of pattern pieces and instructions sheets that have become separated from their envelopes for one reason or another.  I've managed to get about half of these reunited so far. 

boy-ish fabrics from my stash - one of these may become an apron

I've also been going through all of my fabric and weeding out things I know I will never use.  This is especially hard since some things have come to me from other people's stashes and I have held onto them for sentimental reasons.  Nevertheless, with encouragement from both my husband and from my best friend, I have managed so far to pull out a large basket full of fabrics etc to put in the growing donation pile by the door.

wool and lining patiently waiting to become a dress

I am hoping to photograph and catalog the remaining fabrics in my stash so I know what I have.  When I'm done, hopefully it will be easier to pair the patterns I have with the available fabric in my stash.  While I'm happy to be working again, even if just part time and with a nice discount on fabrics, I really need to continue to sew down my stash both for the benefit of our budget and our limited space, and I'm hoping this will help.

Hope your week has started off nicely!