My right arm is giving me fits especially when I type. I think I may need to find some kind of wrist support to help alleviate the discomfort so I can get back to my blog. I read everyone elses but need to take 800 mg of Ibuprofen after more then 2 minutes of typing and before I know it, weeks have flown by and my little blog is still empty.
I have attempted to set my sewing room into a workable happy place...omg, give me a break! Boxes falling on my head, plastic bins stacked high enough to give a cat a nose bleed. Sheesh...then I watch a few episodes of Hoarders and the frenzied attack begins. I have saved quilting magazines since the mid to late 80's and have bought dozens at used book stores, thrift shops, yard sales, flea markets, etc.
So now my question is: do you save your old quilt magazines? I have them stacked in my sewing room but they are taking up so much room. It seems like I am always running across a different quilt I want to make.
Are you a magazine hoarder?
Do you just save pics or patterns?
For the best answer to my dilemna on what I could/should do with my quilting magazine hoard, I will be happy to send the winner a few of my doubles, lol, of my hoard. Omg, I am hopeless!
Now all you have to do is blog about this on your blog and let me know you did. If I get 25 comments, I'll throw in a yard of pumpkin orange.
For 50 comments I'll add a yard of chocolate brown fabric.
For 75 comments I'll toss in a Suze Guzman pattern. Keeps getting more interesting, hmmm?
For 100 comments I think a nice assortment of Valdani threads are in order. Have you ever used http://www.valdani.com/ these fabulous threads? To die, or should I say dye, for you can use on your machine or by hand. I love this stuff!!!!
Now be a good little blogger and spread the cheer. And since I love my International friends, they are included in this.
This will end on the 19th of October in the US. Now, wish me luck on my wrist support and help me figure out what to do with these magazines! Thanks, Elaine...the magazine queen!
I'm sorry to hear your right arm is misbehaving, you need to take life slow, and if you feel pain, stop in doing what you were doing for a little bit, and enjoy life!.
ReplyDeleteWell, I'm not ashamed to say I'm a magazine-holic although I don't have many quilting magazines, unfortunately, but I love to make other crafts,(embroider, knitting, crochet, as an example), I don't really care the magazines falling on my head, I have a hard head, lol, if you don't have enough room, just give them all to me, and I'll promise I have the better place for them all, I'll show you the pics, LOL!
Well, now to your question: do you save your old quilt magazines?, my question is YES!, it's one of my treasures and I love them!, I collect on all the magazine, now about your dilemma, I have a sugestion for you, try to scan the patterns/ pictures you love and make 2 copies in a CD or USB device, just in case something happens to the copy number 1, you have the number 2 there!, you can organize it, table runners, ornaments, place mats, etc etc etc, and then if you're trying to save some space in your sewing room, ehem ehem, you can give them to me, and I'll give them a new, peacefuly and lovely home, I promise!, pinky swear!!!!!!!!, I'll blog about it right now
Oh my gosh Elaine, I have so many magazines and I just find it soooo hard to get rid of them!! I still have the very first quilting mag I bought, American (of course) 1979! Then there are my scrapbooking ones, photography ones and we both love gardening mags..............sigh! So as you can see, I'm no help with your mag-nificent problem!! As to the wrist support, I wore one for a month after some heavy hand quilting sessions and it really did help.
ReplyDeleteLizzie
XXX
I already blogged about it, YAY!, I'd like to wim the prizes from the 50, 75 and 100 comments!!!, and hope they all dissapear and you can see only mines :P oh wait a minute.... did you say magazines sometime? I want them all!, hehehehe
ReplyDeleteI think you should save only the patterns that you want to make and have them in a binder. Since tastes change and such, you could go trough your binder once a year or so and discard the one's that no longer appeal to you. I keep all of my knitting magazines though, so who am I to talk? I hope yoyur wrist feels better soon--how do you sew if it hurts that badly?
ReplyDeleteYou and every other quilter in the world. Since I've been blogging my magazine consumption a has been drastically reduced but I still have heaps. I had a clean out a while back when our quilt group bought a cupboard. We have it almost full of members magazines they no longer want. They are there for everyone to borrow, take, add to themselves. The best bit it feels like I'm not throwing them out just storing them elsewhere (ie. not my sewing room). I'm not sure if thats an option for you.
ReplyDeleteAnother thought is to maybe sell a few on e-bay in small lots. That way you can finance some new ones!!!!!
Hope your arm is better soon. Julie xx
I hope your arm is better soon so you can get back to blogging! I used to keep magazines but the collection grew out of hand and I found that I rarely went back through them. I finally purged and now I am cutting back on magazines all together. The blog world has much better content than magazines!
ReplyDeleteI know about arm and elbow problems. Wrist support is is the way to go. You can go to walmart and get one with the metal braces inside to keep your wrist stable.
ReplyDeleteAs far as magazine go when I don't subscribe to but one magazine. The others I will buy if I like more than one thing in it and then after I read the magazine I will tear out the patterns that I like and put them in a file cabinet. They do take up a lot of room that is why I quit keeping them.
Try to give them to a quilt guild that is having a show and they can sell/give them away. It is a place where there is a lot of quilter traffic and someone may be looking for just what you have - especially new quilters.
ReplyDeleteHi Elaine!!
ReplyDeleteExcellent question. :-) I just answered it with a simple tutorial on my blog, so I'd love an entry in your giveaway.
Hugs
Jenny
xxx
I also found that I had way to many stitching and other assorted magazines. I went through them and gave away the ones that I didn't want anymore. It was sort of bitter sweet because some of them I had gotten many years ago and they were such a comfort to me. I was going through a very diffult time in my life and they brought me such joy. Finally, I decided that it was time to do something with them. I went through them all and found the patterns that I knew I wanted to keep and copied them. I tore patterns from some of the magazines that weren't so precious to me. I bought some really cute notebook dividers and labeled them with x-stitch, embroidery, sewing, etc. and proceeded to file my my saved patterns. I now have a neat notebook with the things that I am really interested in. I am going to post and link to your giveaway on my blog. Please enter me!
ReplyDeleteI only save the ones that interest me. The rest I sned to a quilting friend.
ReplyDeleteI'm a sad case. I find I just can't get rid of them and I must say I do look through them over and over. It's amazing how things in quite old magazines are still quite relevant as different projects arise. But, yes, I do now have trouble finding the pattern I am looking for. My hubby is giving increasingly strong hints that they are to be seriously reduced....but I just can't. Mind you, his motocycle magazines aren't too far behind!
ReplyDeleteI hope your arm stops giving you trouble.
I often buy doubles (not on purpose) so those are easy to dispose of to quilty friends, but I treasure each and every one I buy...they cost a fortune so why wouldn't I?? I have two bookcases and have bought magazine boxes which I store them in. I recently did a big tidy up and I've posted piccies on my blog so you can see if you'd like?! I subscribe to some mags online too, so I save copies and store them on an external hard drive....plenty of room for lots of goodies there!!
ReplyDeleteHope you find an answer that suits you and I hope your arm gets better soon!
'o) Wendy B
Our guild has a "white elephant" sale once a year and we take magazines and sell them real cheap. Sometimes, we even give them away.
ReplyDeleteTake care of your arm by giving it a rest frequently.
Hi Elaine, I have too many magazines and I'm not very organized. I often think I could scan them and put on DVD's but because it´s not a priority I never did it...
ReplyDeleteHope your arm get better.
Manuela
Hi Ekaine....now I relly have one up on you..I'm a newsagent as well as being a quilter....so I get to see all the mags...I make myself pay for them all..that was to try and cut down the ones I "took home for a little look". Now I list them all on my computer with notes as to any really special projects that I really have to make! Then they're all piled in their separate companies. I love dipping into them when I need isnpiration! So...as a magazine seller...just buy them...OK...and enjoy! Give yourself a little break and rest your poor arm. Love Gloria [oh..and I'm blogless still]!
ReplyDeleteOk, I admit to being an organization freak, grin. I drive people crazy with it. I start by cutting the directions out of a magazine for any given pattern, then I pull out the pattern section, find the ones I want and trace them on paper, these and the instructions go into a envelope type folder with the magazine and date and name of the project and type. I do have a box for all the patterns I pull out of magazines, just in case I am looking for something not related to a specific pattern. I never throw away a pattern. I have molded plastic magazine things and I store these folders in them, and yes all quilt ones go together, etc, etc, goes without saying.
ReplyDeleteI also have 27 notesbooks with projects downloaded, again by subject such as knitting, then broken down to what type of knitting, etc, etc. That doesn't even touch the patterns on my computer, and yes they all have their own little folders with folders inside them so I can just click and go with anyone I want.
Right now all my embroidery boms that I am working on for this year are in their folders and the completed blocks are right there also, in a knitting bag stand beside my chair I sitand do all my handwork in.
Don't even talk about organizing all those embroidery threads and yarns, you would fall asleep before I finished telling about that system, grin.
When I find a pattern in a magazine (or book) that I MUST hold on to, I scan it to my computer - first I scan the article/instructions into a pdf file and then I scan the photo as a jpg, so when I'm looking in my (computer) folders I'll be able to tell at a glance if the pattern is what I'm looking for. The exception is if I find 3 or more patterns in one magazine - then I'll keep the entire magazine in a binder (but I'll go back in a year or so and revisit it to make sure I still need to keep it!)
ReplyDeleteAbout every 6 months or so, I write the scanned patterns to a CD. Now I just have to store a relatively small stack of CD's as opposed to purchasing even more paraphernalia to store slippery-slidey magazines!
Now, as soon as I'm done with a magazine, I offer it to my quilty friends at our monthly get-together. If there are no takers, I immediately put them in the recycle bin. It only hurts for a moment or two - not the ongoing frustration of being overrrun by even MORE clutter in my home!
Hope you find out what's going on with your arm - ibuprofen is a wonderful thing, but it can be unkind to your innards...
Tracy in SW WA
FiberBabble
Those threads are to die for ( no pun intended) but first I have to win them :-)
ReplyDeleteI also am a magazine junkie...can't throw anything away ( almost anything) I keep all my magazine ( I don't have as many as you have since English ones are harder to get here and cost an arm & leg...thats why I don't throw them out...that and the fact that I am a hoarder, ask my DH....LOL)
Actually last year when I had to stay in bed due to my back I went through all my magazines and used little Post-it tabs to mark patterns or things I wanted to make. (I wrote the name on the post-it so I could read it at a glance...they all stick out of the magazine top like little soldiers.
If any magazine had no tabs then it went into the "Sell at Quilt Flea market" pile. I knew there was nothing in that magazine I would make and why not sell it and have more money for ...you guessed it ...more magazines! LOL
Liz
Sorry to hear about the arm and elbow, my magazines I name and place in the bookcase. When there is a project I like I place coloured marker slip in the top and write on the marker a brief description.
ReplyDeleteI used to keep a notebook beside my bookcase and if I loaned the magazine I would write the name of the person and the magazine vol and page number if there was somenthing I liked in it. It is quite funny when I go back and look in the magazine so many of the magazines have gone to permanent homes somewhere else and I donnot miss them
Mine are not quilt magazines.....mine are cross-stitch magazines. I eventually gave up asking the newsagent to stock them, because I had over 200 magazines, therefore a lot of patterns to chose from. THEN I discovered the internet, and those magazines are still there - in order, on the shelf waiting for me to give them away. I cannot bring myself to cut them up and at one point created a database of what sort of pattern was in which magazine - but that was old technology. I've attempted to create an excel spreadsheet, but that's an ongoing problem.
ReplyDeleteOccasionally, I have a fit of browse and find something that takes my fancy, but my tastes have changed dramatically. You may have inspired me to have a giveaway on my blog soon...thanks..
I have the same problem as you. Lots of magazines and too little space. I just can't part with them! I have been reading all the comments to get inspiration for what to do with my ever growing pile of magazines!
ReplyDeleteI hope your arm is feeling better now.
I'm in the same boat as everyone else. They are stored in the cardboard magazine holders I buy at KMart and then in a row on a shelf (ok 2 rows). Then there's the stack in the loungeroom and the stack on the kitchen table and the stack on the floor of the sewing room. I absolutely know I need to reduce the sheer volume. My plan is to scan the projects I simply must keep then give the rest away... or sell on e-bay (there's a lot of money invested here! Go ahead, scare yourself, add it up). You know there are more projects here than ten people can make in a lifetime...
ReplyDeleteGood luck!
Donate them to the library, maybe?
ReplyDeleteOh dear! My head is now spinning with all the possibilities.
ReplyDeleteMine are all lined up on a shelf in magazine holders. I put a sticker on the back with the artical and page no. for a quickish reference.
The when I'm looking through the magazine at a later date, I usually find myself adding to the sticker.
Oh and yes then there is a pile in the lounge and a couple of current magazines withing reach.
I have 10 years of gardening magazines stored in plastic sleeves and in folder in our book case.
ReplyDeleteMy sewing mags are stored in free binders I was send with the subscriptions or in recycled bank boxes, not used now, due to computers.
I have posted on my blog with some photos for you to see.....but if your like me....time is so short...lol
Love your blog too. Have fun with your competition.
What an interesting challenge/giveaway? Awesome! I look forward to some ideas as to "what to do with my hoard of magazines"! 8-)
ReplyDeleteI am a hoarder of magazines. I have been trying to manage it though.
ReplyDeleteI use a razor blade and cut out the patterns and articles that I want to keep. (Or think that somebody will use in the future) Then I take all of the pages for the pattern and put them into a plastic page protector and file it away in a three ring binder.
While I haven't yet made a filing system, I intend to file them according to technique (applique, paper piece, etc.)
Hipe this helps!
Juli
Hi Elaine,
ReplyDeleteI'm stopping by after reading about your giveaway on Jenny of Elefantz's blog. I have a very similar organization system as most other people. I pull out the patterns I like and think I'll use and then file them in three ring binders according to the technique or project. I have an entire binder dedicated to tote bags since I LOVE to make those. But, it seems that I just cannot bare to cut into my Quilts and More magazines, so I just store them in a regular magazine holder. I think it would also make sense to have a separate binder specifically for holiday/seasonal projects. If you got a larger binder, you could just put dividers labeled for Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, whatever your holidays are. (If you're outside the US, you might not actually celebrate Thanksgiving, but you might do them for Fall or the different seasons.) I also started a binder recently for patterns I've collected from various places online, that I ended up printing out. Especially Moda Bakeshop, because their patterns use the precuts, which I love. So that binder is divided by the type of pre cut, honey bun, jelly roll, charms, fat quarters, layer cakes, etc. Now, what to do with those magazines you've taken some of the pages out of? See if a local elementary (primary?) school might want them for collage/art projects. You know that quilt magazines have really pretty photography that could be usable in an art class. If you have some that you actually didn't take patterns out of and don't want to keep any longer, you could donate them to the library. I think my library has a basket in the front entry way for "free" magazines for anyone to take if they are interested. Wow, I guess I wrote sort of a looong rambling reply. I hope this helps. It actually reminds me that I have lots of magazines laying around that I "should" go through and file away the projects! Thanks for asking such a useful question.
Anna
Like others, I suggest the binder method. And since I'm just beginning to quilt, I would be more than happy to take on your clutter and make it mine!
ReplyDeleteHi Elaine,
ReplyDeleteI have no other solution than to tell you that you need a bigger house! What you have been doing, you will continue to do and there is no way around it. I think that you are lucky to have so many interests, so continue to live your life to the fullest and enjoy every moment. If you really want to get organized and spend countless hours doing so, the binder idea with protective page covers would be the way to go. You can choose the patterns/articles/projects that you want and put them in a sensible order to you in the binders. Hope this helps!
I am not really organized and I am a begginer in quillting .. so I can offer no-advice :(
ReplyDeleteJust hope your arm is better!
I was moving in 1989 and my sister (who is NOT a hoarder) talked me into throwing away two big boxes of magazines I'd been saving since the early '70's. Have I ever regretted doing it? YES! I often think of the craft instructions in those magazines (the only reason I was saving them), and wonder which ones I could have used (probably none, but I would have HAD them, lol). But, I would suggest that you go through them, and keep only what you want from them, scan the articles or put them into binders - or see if you can find them on the 'net to keep on your computer. Then, with the pages you don't keept, why not make paper quilts out of them for cards, ATC's, scrapbooking, etc? If you don't do those creative arts, chuck 'em. Into the recycling bins, of course.
ReplyDelete