How to Store Sewing Supplies

Storing your sewing supplies so they can be easily seen and found makes all your sewing projects go more smoothly. Rather than digging through a pile of miscellaneous sewing supplies, you'll be able to grab what you need quickly. Sewing is so much easier when you are organized, so here are some tips on how to get started.

Things You'll Need

• Clear plastic shoe boxes
• Plastic-covered paper clips or snack bag clips
• Clear plastic hanging shoe file with pockets
• Clear glass candy jars
• Tool box
• Small plastic boxes with lids
• A magnet
• Small finishing nails or push pins
• Cardboard files

Instructions

1. Use clear plastic shoe boxes to store packages of bias tape, seam binding and braid. You can also wind lengths of lace loosely around your fingertips like you were winding yarn. When you get all the lace wound into a loose roll, secure the end with a plastic-covered paper clip or snack bag clip. Store the bundles of lace in a plastic shoe box too.

2. See exactly the color of thread you need when you store all your spools in the pockets of a hanging shoe file. Thread doesn’t get dusty and each color can have its own pocket. Save hundreds of buttons in clear glass (or plastic) candy jars. A covered candy dish or tin with a close-fitting lid can be handy for small scissors and packets of machine needles and hand sewing needles, especially with toddlers or pets in the house. It's harder for tiny fingers or paws to get a candy dish open and possibly get stuck with a needle or scissor points.

3. Store all the items the sewing machine needs for regular maintenance in one tool box, like machine oil, any tiny tools that came with it, the instruction booklet, and a small brush for getting those bits of thread out of the shuttle assembly and under the feed dogs. Keep the tool box close to your sewing machine. You could even use it as a footstool under your sewing machine cabinet or table, if space is really tight in your sewing area.

4. Put all your pins in small plastic boxes with lids. The pins are much easier to pick up while you're laying out a pattern, for example, and you can use your pin cushions for needles. And a magnet can help you find those lost pins on the floor quickly. If you want, glue the magnet to the inside of the lid, and then simply flip the box top over and use the pins that are standing at attention because they're stuck to the magnet.

5. Hang yardsticks and rulers using ribbons tied through the hole in the end and a small nail or a push pin. Put sewing patterns in cardboard files, and label the outside of each drawer with the contents. Sewing material can be folded neatly and stored flat on the wire racks in a closet. You'll still be able to see the color and pattern of the material.

Tips & Warnings

• Get an old-fashioned pincushion, one of the fat tomato kind, and remember to run your hand sewing needles through it regularly. The small tomato is stuffed with emery, which sharpens your needles nicely.

• Don't store fragile or heavy plush or pile fabrics on wire racks, especially if you have more than a yard of the material. Wire racks make great storage, but they can also put lines in delicate silks, velvet or velveteen which are hard to smooth or steam out.