The fabric collection spreadsheet

Shannon of Hungry Zombie Couture is an Organizational Goddess.  Seriously!  Her last couple of blog posts have been about her fabric closet, how she organized & folded it and how she keeps track of her fabric.  Since I'm getting ready to move my fabric from the bins to fabric shelves, these posts really caught my eye.


After moving all of this fabric from the old apartment to the new townhouse, I've decided that somewhere there should be some kind of list of exactly what I own.  I have a good idea in my head but I can tell you that I definitely found pieces that I'd forgotten about as I packed up the collection.  So instead of laying out and cutting my gray pieces last night, I embarked upon making my own fabric excel spreadsheet.

I decided to start with the pieces that are laying around.  I can tell you that this is a very involved process and I applaud anyone who has maintained this type of database.  I've entered exactly 17 pieces of fabric and I'm in awe of how much work this is.  I think I'm gonna enter a few of the fabric bins before they are opened and placed on the shelves because can I say it again, this is ALOT of work!  *LOL*


However, I've learned a few things:
1.  Did you know that both Fabric Mart and fabric.com keep a listing of all your fabric purchases.  
Now this can be a good and a bad thing.  Good because I was able to find a piece of fabric on Fabric Mart's site that I purchased in 2005 enabling me to get most of the specifics onto the spreadsheet.  However, they have every purchase I've made since 2005...people that's 7 years of fabric buying which is definitely the bad side.


2.  Even the coupon codes are listed on both sites.
So you not only know how much the yardage originally was but what discount you received.


3.  Thank goodness that I've been tagging my fabric as it's shown up.  It will make putting most of the entries in very easy...time-consuming but easy.


I've only got 17 pieces entered but I want to keep this up because it's not only informative but it will be very helpful.  It's just a very large task entering all of the fabric I have...guess I'll just have to take it one piece at a time.


There was a question on my "Thanks" post from Szmusil...
"Regarding wool...Once your garments are sewn, how do you care for them?  Do you dry clean?  Hand wash?  Some other method?"


Szmusil - let me tell you first that I have ALOT of clothes.  For the last few years on average I've made at least one garment a week.  So most of my clothing gets one or two wearings a season.  Pants get a little more wear but I'm trying to change that by wearing more dresses/skirts or my jeans to work and changing into a dress or a skirt. Okay so that was a huge aside but I think it's important to understand why I chose the method of cleaning that I have.  I dry clean my wool garments and not very often because I don't wear them repeatedly.  I just like how they are cleaned and how they come back pressed.  I know that drycleaning is not everyone's preferred method of cleaning but it works for me.


I think I'll get to the actual business of sewing tonight so more about the new pieces soon...


...as always, more later!