Antique Sewing Cabinet

One of my favorite things to do in the springtime is hitting the garage sales that seem to pop up everywhere. Sometimes you find some really cool things for great prices! I love that you never know what you are going to find! I especially love vintage items that can be re-purposed. I found one such item a few weeks ago...a vintage folding sewing cabinet. I can't say I was looking for one, or had even seen one before, but it looked pretty cool, and at only $2 it was a real steal! It needed a good cleaning and a little wood glue, but other than that it's in great condition. I thought my Mom who is a quilter would love to have this, if not to actually use, for a decoration in her sewing room. Unfortunately, her room...like mine, is pretty much overflowing with items and she didn't want it. I took it home and started to look for things in my stampin' studio that might fit in it so that it could possibly work for storage for me. This is what i came up with.

At first I had hoped to hang it on the wall, but it took up too much wall space. The only spot I had that it would have fit, it just wouldn't have been handy. So I moved a couple things around and was able to set it up right across from my desk so that I can see what I have there at a glance.

The top shelf fits my small collection of washi tape, with room for more on the shelf below. The 3rd shelf his some extra ribbon that is retired, but I still use often. I wish the space was a tad bigger as the ribbon just fits and to get it out without destroying the spool I have to turn it a little, hence the space between groups. The bottom cubby fits the stampin' cases so I stored a few background stamps and some retired packs of DSP from when they were 4x6 pads. I decorated some of the shelves with washi tape and made a little banner for it as well. The vintage hankie is something I picked up at an antique shop.

 The other side holds my spools of bakers twine on the top shelf...I'm sure originally it was made for spools of thread. Below that I put my most used jars of embossing powders. Now I can easily see them at a glance instead of digging through a bin in a drawer. The middle bin holds some finished cards that are ready to mail along with a couple retired background stamps I still use quit often. The bottom shelf just has a few decor items, with some background paper behind it. I may add more paper behind other areas, but haven't decided yet. Here's a view of how it looks sitting across from my desk.

and another view of my room...

I figure if I need to make more room I can easily fold it up and move it out, for now it's working out well and I love the nostalgic charm it adds to the room.

UPDATE: I recently shared a story here about a WWII Veteran who was to celebrate his 100th birthday on June 6th and hoped to receive 100 cards. I know I sent him one and I knew many of you would send him a card as well, so I figured he would surely exceed 100 cards. I got to wondering just how many cards did he end up receiving? I figured maybe a couple thousand??? I checked to see if there was an update to his story, and...Mr. Fabela received OVER 55K cards!!! Isn't that fantastic!? Here is the link to his story which includes a video of him opening some of the goodies he received. He was so overwhelmed with emotion. Thanks to everyone who took the time to send him a card.