Heaven in my Mudroom......

Wanna have a peek at my scrap area? It's in my mudroom, just off the kitchen. I love the split door that leads the way to my little bit of heaven! This is where I spend a lot of my time. I love my mud room!

This is the main counter where I work. I work best standing, so this is perfect for me. The upper cabinets are full of my LOM Storage albums, some books for inspiration, glues, alphabets in DMC floss storage boxes, and tons and tons of stamp sets from Stampin' Up!. On top of the cabinets are some baskets. One is full of ribbon, another foam alphabet stamps, tins and other boxes waiting to be altered, and tubs full of stamps. There is a tall pantry on the end. One side has 2 tall, Iris carts that has all of my paper scraps in it; one drawer per color. I also have my Paper/Sticker Binder in there that is full of stickers. The other side has an Iris cart that has ribbon and some odds and ends that need to be organized, my Big Shot Die-Cutter and dies, and binders with alphabet stickers and letter templates. The left upper cabinet has my albums and light box and the right upper cabinet has more Stampin' Up! stamp sets and my sewing box.

Another small cabinet is across from the main work area. I try to just keep things on this side that I use often, but aren't needed right by my side when I work. The cabinet above my washer has 8.5x11 paper, idea books and a couple of boxes of papers waiting to be filed. The cabinet above the dryer has cleaning supplies.

Here's another look at my main work area. The white drawer units house my 4-categories of photos using the Library Of Memories System that is explained in the book "Photo Freedom" by Stacy Julian. The cabinets directly below have more boxes full of photos and memorabilia. The gray drawer units are full of embellishments and other odds 'n ends, like buttons, ribbon scraps, paper clips and other metal accents, etc. The green drawer units are also for the LOM System. They hold my 2-inch square photos. One drawer for each child. I also have two of the Designing With calendars by Autumn Leaves sitting there for inspiration. The white basket has fun bits and scraps, like movie tickets, receipts, paint chips, and what-not (this is part of the LOM System). In the corner is a white tool-turn-around full of things that I use often, scissors, tweezers, pens, pencils, glue pens, paint brushes, stipple brushes, etc. The little basekt by the lamp is full of small stamps - including ones that say 'stamped by', 'scrapbook page made by', and other fun ones to embelish envelopes before mailing. The right-side cabinet is full of all of my 12x12 paper. The drawers hold - from left to right-
1. watercolor pencils, chalks, oil pastels
2. acrylic paints (the rest is empty, this had my Radiant Pearls and Pearl Ex inside it also, but I had to move these out of the reach of my 2 year old! She loved playing w/ these and opened one and made a huge mess!)
3. adhesives, hand-held hole punches, eyelets and eyelet setter
4. paper cutters, circle cutter, rulers, crimper, heat gun

The drawer unit here has my Radiant Pearls, Pearl Ex, ink refills, my Colorbox ink pads, embossing powders, and punches. Sitting on top of the drawers is an old CD case holder. I have my unmounted stamps in clear cases stored here, along with my box of Stampin' Up! markers and some music CD's to listen to while I'm scrapping. Then I have three cassette tape holders that hold all of my stamp pads. The cabinets are full of my canning supplies and other kitchen items that I don't use every day.

This little area ontop of my washer is new. Well, I've had the pink crate there, but beside it was a basket of fabric scraps. I decided to turn this little area into my thinking spot. I am trying to read my Bible more and do some faith-journaling. I have tried to set up a little prayer spot in other places in my house, but nowhere seemed to work well for me. I am hoping that since my scrap room is already such a creative place for me, and MY SPOT, that this will be the perfect place for me to sit and relax and pray. So, I have some my Bibles here and some prayer books. The small file box behind the books has file folders in it for the quarter. The pink file crate has file folders for the rest of the year (ones that will be moved into the small file box later) and a file folder for each month. This is a system that Dawn talks about in depth on her website. She developed this system to help her organize her homeschooling, but I have been able to modify it to work for me and managing my 4 kids (and myself!). I'll share about all of that at another time.

That's it for now. I hope you enjoyed seeing my scrap area. I hope to share more photos soon of what's behind all of those closed, cabinet doors!