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craft

Fabric Gluttony

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Fabric gluttony
Fabric gluttony

I spent my Saturday organizing my fabric (I just got married, and the entire house is getting reorganized to make room for my husband). I was surprised that it filled 20 boxes. This isn’t a fabric stash, or a collection, it’s fabric gluttony!

About 80% of it is vintage, from garage sales and auctions over the last nine years. There is a box of feedsacks, several boxes of vintage cotton prints, mod 60s canvas, barkcloth, and one box of silk, velvet, and lace. A big part of it came from one sale. Cheri called me on Saturday morning, and said “Estate sale. Fabric. GO NOW.”

When Cheri says that, you listen! It was the estate of a seamstress and milliner. Table after table of beautiful Scottish woolens and retro cotton prints! I spent every dollar I had, filled four boxes, and nearly doubled my collection.

Now that the fabric is sorted, it will be stored in an upstairs closet until I decide where my new craft area will go. It is currently in banker boxes, but they aren’t acid free, so they are a temporary storage solution. I will probably regret the number of boxes as I carry them upstairs! But, now that our only local fabric store has closed, I (and the rest of my crafty family!) will be glad that I have it! Fabric gluttony is a sin I can live with.

—Loryn

It’s Saturday and Garage Sales

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My sister is the master of garage sales and I refuse to go to a sale without her. I can walk through a sale and see nothing, nothing and more nothing. I go home and start muttering things. Not good things. “I wasted my gas for this! Does everybody buy from the same stores? Are all the vintage items stored away in collections?” But when my sis is along the world is our shopping mall. She sees the shelves I’ve been wanting in the back corner under a furnace, the comforter that is just perfect for padding my couch cushion in a box covered by Happy Meal toys and that vintage kitchen utensil with the red handle hiding in a carton of plastic lids. I don’t pretend to understand it. She’s a genius and I float behind in her tailwind gathering the good finds.

It was hot today and getting hotter, but we found some cool deals. Our first sale was so much fun that we didn’t need to go anywhere else. Of course we did go elsewhere but that urge for the hunt had been satisfied and anything else we found would be gravy.

Chicago is the nearest city with an Ikea and I have despaired of ever getting there. Two and a half hours is not really that long to spend in a car, but the thought of traffic and the cost of gas have kept me rooted in this small town. Anyway I found some items from Ikea at a sale today. I don’t know what they are but I bought them because I figure I can go on the internet and learn the details later. That is the way to shop a garage sale.

-Lynne