I got rid of my craft supplies! Craft Room Tour

Okay, okay, I only got rid of 90% of my craft supplies but guys …. 90% is A LOT! My last craft room tour was two years ago. I am so excited to finally unveil my redesigned craft room with much less stuff in it. I started remodeling this space in February 2017 and I finally finished it. I'm going to show you every single nook and cranny in this craft space and explain my whole philosophy behind what I kept and what I got rid of. Are you ready? Let's goooooooooo!!!

Keep reading to learn more about what furniture and organizers I used plus see WHY I did the things I did. Watch this video on YouTube to see everything from start to finish!! SUBSCRIBE to my channel to get notified when I post more craft room organizing ideas like this!

This post contains affiliate links.

Get all the craft room tours right here!

Before you go off into YouTube land, I want to let you know there is a super awesome goodie in this blog post. Scroll the to the bottom or keep reading to find out what it is!

I am also super excited to be sharing my craft room as part of a week long tour with 24+ other crafters. You're in for a LOT of great organizing ideas and tips and you can find them all listed in one place on The Country Chic Cottage: 2018 Craft Room Blog Hop

Now, let's get started!

Why I got Rid of 90% of my craft supplies

I'm starting with this because, besides the crazy colors in my craft room, this is the most shocking thing about my craft room tour.

I mean, WHO DOES THAT?

Why I got rid of so much of my craft stash

I literally got rid of 90% of my stuff. There are so many reasons why I got rid of my craft stash.

Having a lot of stuff was a burden

Now 90% might sound like a lot and it definitely was a lot of stuff and it was a lot of money. But I feel a lot better not having all of the extra stuff hanging over my head.

I felt guilty about my stuff … and felt like I couldn't buy new goodies

I always felt like I had to look in my stash for supplies rather than go shopping when I wanted to work on a new project.

There are so many cool new things coming out in the craft world all the time. But I felt like I couldn't really go buy them because I had so much stuff I needed to be using. I should be using. I felt bad about not using …

I spent all of my time organizing … and not crafting!

One day my husband made a comment to me about how much time I spent organizing my supplies.

When we would be watching TV, I would wheel over one of my rolling carts or a crop bag. Then I would spend an hour or so organizing. I used to actually make crafts while watching TV but over the years I started making fewer crafts and spending more time organizing.

Crafts weren't making me happy anymore

I realized that all of this stuff wasn't making me as happy anymore as it did when I first bought it.

It was taking time away from creating because I had to spend all my time organizing and cleaning up.

Also, because there was so much stuff it was really hard to actually make any projects because there was so much stuff to go through. I'm super duper organized but when you have a huge volume of stuff it just makes everything take longer, no matter how organized you are.

Even more reasons why a huge craft stash was bad … for me

I went ahead and made a short list of the reasons why I got rid of most of my stash:

• I just had too much stuff – it was overwhelming any time I wanted to create
• I was always organizing
• I had trouble finding things I wanted – not because I was disorganized but because of the sheer volume of stuff I had
• I realized all of those supplies were not making me happy
• The huge stash made me feel like I couldn't buy or enjoy new things
• I had loads of guilt because I wanted to buy new things rather than use my old stash of craft supplies
• I had guilt over the money I spent to build that huge stash of craft supplies, so much guilt that I started hating my supplies and thought about throwing everything away

Do you ever feel yourself identifying with any of these same feelings about your stuff?

You're not alone!

I started a Facebook group for anyone who wants to get organized called “The Organized Crafter. I would absolutely love it if you joined the group.

Click here to JOIN The Organized Crafter Group now

How I decided what to keep, what to toss, and what to donate

After I made the decision to get rid of my stuff, I had to figure out how to actually get rid of it.

Real life versus TV organizing shows

You know those TV shows where they go through a hoarders house and they make a “keep” pile and a “toss” pile and a “donate” pile? It actually doesn't work that easily in real life.

In real life you don't have the time or space or manpower or willpower or emotional fortitude to go through an entire craft rooms worth of stuff in one afternoon.

How do you organize your craft room in real life?

This process of deciding what to keep, what to get rid of, and what to give away literally took me three and a half years. I worked at it gradually month after month while still creating projects in my space.

After going through this process of figuring out what to keep and what to get rid of over and over and over, a few things became really clear to me. In fact, the process of how to determine what to keep and what to get rid of became super clear.

How to decide what to keep and what to toss

Here's some of the processes that I used for determining whether or not something should stay in my space:

• I got super real about what I actually use and what I was keeping because someone else thought it was cool or someone else gave me the item. Was I keeping it because of guilt?
• I asked myself when was the last time I used this?
• I asked myself how do I plan to use this?
• I got in touch with my woo-woo side — how did I feel when I thought about or held the item? If the item felt like a burden or made me anything but excited, it had to GO!

Craft organizing is emotional

I know this process is not easy. It's actually challenging not just physically but emotionally as well. Yes, we have feelings wrapped up in our craft supplies too!

If only there was a guide to help organize craft supplies!

I created a super awesome guide to help you with figuring out what to keep and what to get rid of in your space. It's easiest if you start with one type of supply; this guide focuses on tools.

Tools are usually what we spend the most money on and they usually determine where we're going to store things in our space.

Click here to download the Craft Room Tools Organizing guide for free and get started on organizing and purging your space.

What did I do with the stuff I got rid of?

It sounds super easy to just sell your stuff off when you're getting rid of things.

Don't sell your craft supplies in a yard sale

But anyone who's had a yard sale knows that it's actually really hard to communicate the value of things to other people. That item might have cost $20 when you bought it but now it's not even worth 50 cents to a year sale buyer. It kinda stings!

Plus it can just become plain overwhelming to always be having yard sales or listing items on eBay to sell.

A better way to get rid of your craft stash:

Here are just a few of the different places where I got rid of my stash:

Give your craft supplies to Teachers

I posted on Facebook asking any local teachers if they wanted to come by my house and pick up a load of supplies for their students. I literally filled several teachers cars to the roof with supplies. I recently filled two trash bags with stamps, paint, and stencils for a middle school art teacher.

Donate unwanted craft supplies to Schools

Schools can always use art supplies and crafts supplies, not just for their art blocks, but also for science and other educational activities.

Find a teacher at your local elementary school who will accept the supplies from you and distribute them to the other teachers. I got super lucky with my son's 3rd grade teacher and even now years later she still takes craft supplies from me and give them out to the other teachers.

Get a tax break – donate craft supplies to charity

Check with your local charitable organizations to see what types of craft supplies they can use or sell and which they don't.

Sell your unwanted craft supplies … as a last resort

You can sell your supplies on etsy, Facebook Groups, and even via apps, like the new D-Stash app on iOs!

Check out this post with 17 Places to Sell Your Craft Stash for more ideas.

2018 Craft Room Tour

Now that I've talked about how I got rid of all of this stuff, it's time to do the actual craft room tour!  I'm super excited to show you the full reveal of my newly remodeled craft space. Though I do have to be completely honest, I have changed a few things since I took these photos just a few weeks ago. You'll have to wait until next year's tour to see those changes though! LOL To see a 360º view of this space, CLICK HERE!

This post contains affiliate links.

The biggest change I made

The biggest change in this craft room over my craft room tours from previous years is that I made this space for me. We spend too much time organizing our stuff and we don't spend enough time actually making a space that supports how we create.

Why we have craft rooms

Our craft room is a tool that is supposed to help us be as creative as possible. It's supposed to help us be efficient with our creativity  and to inspire us be creative within the space.

It was all for other people

As I went through the purging process I discovered that all of these craft room iterations that I had made in the past, I had made them for other people. I had created them because I wanted people to tell me how amazing my craft space was. I wasn't making those spaces for myself. I wasn't fully considering how the space would actually help me create or inspire me to be creative.

The mistake I did not want to make again

As I got rid of things that I bought to impress other people, things that I didn't actually really love, realized I had wasted a lot of money and a lot of effort. I wasn't going to do that in this new space.

I invested in furniture that I love , like these two cabinets.

In the past, I used hand-me-downs and thrift shop items. While thrift shop items are affordable and awesome if you love them, they weren't items that I actually really loved. I was partially making do with what I could find and also trying to use stuff that I thought others would think looks good.

Tips for buying craft room furniture

This time around I bought craft storage and furniture that I liked and it had nothing to do with what anyone else would say. I bought the white cabinets above and below from Lamps Plus. They have a mixture of all kinds of things that are important to me and that I use.

Yes, one of them is full of props for my recipe blog posts. If the space is yours, you make the rules. Who says pretty plates can't be in a craft room?

Before you buy craft organizers, do this

Before I made any big purchases, I prioritized the things that I wanted to use most. Knowing what was going to be a top priority for me to use help me decide which furniture to keep, which furniture to buy, and how to arrange that furniture within the space.

Everything else that was not a top priority I either got rid of or stored it. There are things like sewing machines that I only use a couple times a year that I still want to keep but don't need to have a prominent place on a tabletop.

There are some things that I wish that I had kept but overall there really are very few things that I actually miss.

It doesn't have to match

There are two faux card catalogs from Hobby Lobby that don't match the other white furniture at all. Who cares?! I love these pieces for the way they look and the storage. They are filled with all kinds of treasures in labeled drawers, treasures I use often.

Paint Storage

Above these card catalogs are frame shelves from Ikea filled with paints, inks, and stamps. Recently, I purged a ton of stuff from these shelves so they are not this full. I think I'll put some rolls of ribbon and twine on the empty shelves … but we'll see; I kinda like them empty.

Here's what they look like full:

It's okay to have empty space in your craft room

I embraced the idea that it's okay to have empty space. In the past I had empty drawers and I was very happy to have those empty drawers to grow into.

Now I have a lot more empty space, not just in my drawers but on the table tops and within the room itself. There's room to grow but it's also room to be able to move, play, and create.

When you have a space that is full of so much stuff that you can't hardly move around without bumping into something, that can stifle your creativity. Having the room to be able to spread out if I wanted to has really changed the way that I feel in the space and how I create.

Favorite Craft Organizer: Alex Drawers from Ikea

I love the Alex drawer units because they are sleek and the shallow wide drawers are perfect for pulling out and seeing all of your supplies at once. Sometimes I have them stacked like this and other times I use them as two separate units, replacing the casters on the top unit so it will roll around.

I've recently moved and unstacked these Ikea Alex drawer units since the beginning of the year when I took these photos. I'm using them to build a set for filming videos and I want them close to where I'll be creating, for easy access.

Why shallow drawers are better for organizing craft supplies

Years ago, I had drawers twice as deep filled to the brim with supplies. Now I have drawers filled about 3/4 of the way with craft supplies in one to two colors per drawer. It makes it alot easier to see everything I have in one glance so I don't forget about supplies. Plus I can grab what I need and get back to creating faster than digging through a deep drawer.

Buying a craft table

One of the things I realized I didn't have any more was a proper craft table. In my studio, I have a large bar height table for making videos but I didn't have a table to actually craft at, just for fun. I went shopping for a new craft table!

This table from Ikea perfectly fits in the space and matches my sit/stand office desk (also from Ikea). This corner of the room is set up as a place where I can “just craft”. I've been working in the crafts industry for over 15 years as MY JOB.

Make a space to spark your mojo

I realized through this process of purging and remodeling my space that I had lost my mojo. This space is just for me to be inspired and make things. I've got a few scrapbook pages in progress on the table.

The table is decorated with things that spark my creativity. There's an oil painting that my grandma, a huge craft inspiration for me, painted of my mom. I've got a wire shelf that I love, which I spray painted white, filled with bits and baubles I use or just like to look at. I can't wait to get into this part of my space and use it more!

If you're looking for craft table ideas, check out this post on the newest craft tables available now.

Cube Storage with Ikea Kallax

To the right of this table is an Ikea Kallax shelving unit filled with paper and bins of fabric and supplies. While I love the Kallax line at Ikea, it's a little pricey and Ikea is far away. If I were to do things over again, I might get these.

Baskets for Kallax Units

I used locker style baskets for the fabric and scrapbook kits.  These locker baskets were on clearance at Target almost 10 years ago but I actually like these better because you can access what's inside without having to pull the basket out all the way.

To store felt sheets and other difficult to store supplies like rolling stamps, I used fabric bins. They fit perfectly in the 16″ wide Kallax cube openings. I got mine at Target a long time ago but you can use either this style or these (available in multiple sizes) in the same Kallax unit in a similar way.

Keep your tools out so you can use them

I set my Silhouette and Cricut on top of the Kallax unit so they can be at the ready all the time. From here, they can be plugged in to the computer, iPad, or a laptop. They are on and ready to go at all times because I made it a top priority to use them in my space.

As of August 2018, I haven't used the Silhouette at all but I've used the Cricut for several projects (like this!). It may not seem like I am using them alot but it's a whole lot more than when the Cricut was sitting in it's box for a year (yes, I did that).

Did you grab that free tool organizing guide yet? I totally followed the method I share in that guide when organizing my space.

A craft room, home office combo

My craft room is now also my home office in a much bigger way than before. Way back when I started this journey, this was 100% craft room. Slowly over time, it has morphed into my office as I added my computer, printers, and office furniture. I really like being able to look up from my desk and be inspired by my colorful craft supplies and projects as I look across the room.

Customize your space with paint

The back wall of my space has a crazy painted wall and a few shelves of items I just love. I wanted the space to feel full of energy and action. I think this paint job does that!

This awesome bookcase was an affordable find at Ikea in the as-is section. Did you know they have a section of the store where they sell returns, displays, and damaged items at a discount? It's my first stop every time I go into Ikea!

And speaking of IKEA CRAFT ROOMS … I've got a post about them where you can grab my free guide to Ikea Craft Rooms. I know, I have all the free guides for you to download *wink wink*

A rolling cart for craft supplies

Now if we're talking Ikea, it's not an Ikea craft room without a Raskog cart. I've got two of these bad boys – one for craft supplies and one for supplies I use when shooting videos, like Clorox wipes and masking tape.

I go into detail about my Raskog in this video I shared on the Smart Fun DIY Facebook Page recently:

And that's it! I hope you enjoyed this tour of my space and the insight into why I did all the things I did.

You can SAVE this post by pinning the image below. And before you go, let me know what your biggest challenge is with your craft space? Do you have photos! Share them in the comments or in The Organized Crafter Facebook Group.