For pretty much the whole of 2009, my stuff has been spread out over the surface of our house’s nicest, newest room; “The Addition”. Fancy room, fancy name, I know.  We actually tried to come up with other names for “the Addition”. The only one I really remember is “The Lido Deck”, after that area on the Love Boat where it seemed like all the action was always happening. “The Lido Deck” never really stuck. I probably don’t have to tell you that.

Anyway, no one else really seemed to mind, but after a while having such a large part of the common area of the house overtaken by batting, and cutting tools, and vinyl and fabric and machinery gets old. It’s hard to create and really dive into crap when you have to stop and clear the table for lunch and dinner. It’s a distraction from the process when you know that you have made it so that the rest of the family could sustain injury, either from accident or “interruption rage”. (The phenomenon that occurs when the perfect storm of extreme concentration and frustration mix with the unreasonable request for dinner from an outside party).

We throw a fairly large Christmas extravaganza here every year (to be honest, these parties were the excuse for building the addition in the first place) and that pending event, coupled with the exodus of my oldest son from his basement domain finally inspired a change.

Jordan’s former room in the basement is bright and roomy- our house is an ancient battle ship whose foundation rises high off the ground and affords us larger than standard windows. Its semi finished, meaning that there are paneled walls, with lots of newer plugs for the sewing machines and iron, but more importantly, for the laptop and the iPod dock. I am able to have all my fabric in open view, thanks to an awesome Ikea storage unit that Jordan left behind. There is also room for a permanent cutting area/place to drop stuff when my mind is distracted and my arms are full. I list these features only semi jokingly, because I think it’s super important to know yourself; the practical things, like room enough for organized storage and an uncluttered view, but also you need to cater to yourself. If you are the kind of person who is going to need Hulu streaming, or music playing at inappropriate volume level to get you through your process, allow for that. If you know that you get so immersed in what you are doing that you can’t clean and organize as you go, give yourself an area to pile crap, and make the commitment to not let said crap to get out of hand. If you need a series of booby traps set up to signal and slow the progress of approaching children or spouses so that you can slip through a secret door into a panic room…but you get my point.

I know that a lot of you are limited as far as space. I am lucky that I was able to drive out one of my young and reap this paradise for myself. Barring my opportunities, you might try and carve out a dedicated space to work with what you do have. Figure out what you need to give yourself the peace to get into the zone, and give it to yourself, whether you have the room to make it permanent or not. Allow yourself a little luxury; it helps your mind relax and makes crafting more the escape it was meant to be.

That… or that perky tramp Julie just informed me that yoga follows the shuffle board tournament in 15, up on the Lido. Now that there’s room, that is.