Where Do You Craft?

I read these magazines about scrapbooking, and they give the impression that EVERYONE has this fabulous craft space. Everyone, that is, except me. I'd never even given thought to having a scrapbooking desk before Christmas 2007, when a friend of mine received a scrapbooking desk from her husband for Christmas. But she had been scrapbooking for a long time, and her sister was a Creative Memories consultant. So she probably had good use for a desk.

Still...a craft desk? Or even a space in my house dedicated just for crafting? That's an interesting idea. I grew up working on crafts where-ever. I cross-stitched in front of the tv. Worked on school projects at the kitchen table. We had 5 people in our house when I was growing up. There was no room for a dedicated craft place.

That was then. My mom now has a table in a corner of her familyroom, where she does alot of sewing. After retirement, my aunt started up her own embroidery business and set up shop in her basement. I have another friend who recently was able to take an entire room and set it up for crafting. Granted, that room had been her the bedroom of her recently passed father. I know she'd have rather had her dad here. But she still was able to repurpose the room for her special area.

Where does that leave me? To date, I have been scrapbooking at the kitchen table. On the nights I want to scrapbook, I have to drag all my containers of supplies out to the table. They take up half the table, and we eat at the other half. Since it's just hubby and myself, it's not that big of a deal. I can even leave them there over time. But when company is coming over, I have to drag everything back into the computer room, where everything is stacked in somewhat neat stacks on the floor. I started out with everything in a nice drawer in my "craft center" in the closet. The stash quickly outgrew the storage space.

I'm on the verge of changing all this. A few months ago, I found a desk in the latest Ikea magazine that I think will be perfect. (I'm an Ikea junkie.) It will have a bookshelf of 16 cubes, with a nice-sized desk part attached. We're going to reorganize the loft in our condo, to fit the desk, the elliptical, and the large craft-drawer unit that I've had for years (also an Ikea find, but from their kitchen section. I bought it for extra kitchen storage in my apartment and made it craft storage once I moved into my condo.)

I am so jazzed to get this set up. I have no idea how it's all going to fit in that loft. It's a nice sized loft, but we're still going to have to do some arranging. The hubby will have to figure out how to run cable to the tv up there too. Because not only do I like to watch tv while I'm exercising, but I love to watch tv while scrapbooking, too. But that's another chat all together.

We're tentatively making the trip to Ikea next Saturday. So once I have the desk, and have the whole loft set up, I'll post some pics!