Yup, that about sums it up!! I decided I must have experienced a bout of insanity recently when I decided to revamp my system of sorting and how I store my stash of beads.
It all began when Lisa Kan released her latest book, Bead Metamorphosis, which btw, is fabulous and you should definitely give a look see, if you haven't already.
OK, I digress here... so as I was saying, it all began with the release of Lisa's new book. A friend of mine purchased this book for herself at Christmas time and she was enthralled with the projects in it, but also the knowledge Lisa shared with the beady world. I don't know if it was something Lisa specifically suggested in the book or just an idea my friend came up with after thoroughly exploring Lisa's book, but.... my friend decided that she would re-sort her stash into groups of beads by color rather than storing her stash by size and shape. It seemed like a great idea on the surface. One could only surmise that it would be extremely helpful to know exactly what one had available in varying sizes given any color scheme. My friend believed that it would prove to be time-saving as well, because you could just pick any color, go to your stash and have available at your fingertips all the bead types and sizes in that particular color to work with. Seems simple enough, right?
After making her decision, it took only about a week and a half before she twisted my arm and talked me into re-arranging my stash accordingly. :) OK, so maybe she didn't have to twist my arm... I am always up for trying something new, especially if it makes my life easier, and believe me this should have, because I have been known to spend literally hours sorting through my beads looking for a particular color of something!!
Enter Phase 1 of insanity.... You know what I am talking about. That phenomena when you are thinking about tackling a project and you tell yourself that you will breeze right through this and it will only take you an hour or two to complete the project, and it ends up taking you three or four days?!?!?!
Yup,that about sums it up!! It seemed like it took forever to go through each of my containers and sort them into little piles of color here and there all over my living room. Everywhere I turned there was a different pile of color staring back at me. No kidding, it took me at least two days to get them sorted into piles... and my stash is nowhere as big as most. I think I have like ten containers of beads... which really isn't all that much in comparison to some stashes I'm aware of. So why did it take so long? I have no idea...lol, the only thing I can think is that I had just too much fun going through them all and "remembering" what I actually had. I will say this; after all was said and done, this exercise proved very insightful. I discovered I had very little beads in some colors that I thought I had lots of....lol, and I had a multitude in other colors that I didn't think I was very fond of. Well, I must be fonder than I know, because otherwise, why would I have such a huge collection of them?? It definitely showed me where my stash lacked and where it didn't. In betweenst all that sorting, I somehow managed to begin three new projects, one of which I have completed, and the other two are works in progress. Thought I would post some sneak peeks for you to look at, while taking this journey with me. :)
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Blue Ingenue Bracelet |
OK, so once I had them all sorted, I had to put them all away again. (I'm hearing a collective sigh!) That proved to be mind boggling also, because then I had to decide which colors to group together in each container. For example, when it came to purple... they took up an entire container of their own... but not so much with things like pink, red and yellow.
Enter Phase 2 of insanity....Listen to your little voice! The entire time I was putting away the newly sorted, by color beads, I kept having this nagging, kind of uncomfortable feeling. Did I listen to my little voice? Nope!!
Yup, that about sums it up!! Enter Phase 3 of Insanity.... Denial! Deep, down inside me, I knew that this new system wasn't for me, but I kept telling myself that this was going to be great and so much easier when it came to choosing beads and colors for a new design. I was lying to myself. One day, when I was on FB this woman posted a picture of her bead stash and she had them all sorted into huge tubs full of beads. For example, all the browns and each of their respective shades were in one tub, greens in another and so on and so on. I thought how wonderful that she has such a huge collection, and I admit, I was a bit envious... but upon deeper introspection, I thought, OH MY GOSH! I could easily see myself spending an entire day going through any one tub looking for a specific size and color of bead. Now, don't get me wrong, I have absolutely nothing against sorting your beads by color, if that's what system works for you, but as it turned out, it isn't the system that works for me.
Well,... not wanting to admit defeat to myself... I tried living with the new system for about a week and a half... until I began a new design. The strangest thing happened and I made a profound discovery about myself and my design process. Perhaps when creating a new design, most people choose a color palette they want to work with first, but I tend to choose the type of bead I want to work with first, and the colors second. That's huge and really important for me to know about myself. When it came time to choose and find beads in this new system of mine, completely lost and seriously confused. What I thought was going to take a shorter amount of time actually took twice as long, because I seriously couldn't recall what type bead I had available in any particular color. The end result was that I spent more time going through each color looking for particular types of beads. With my original system, I could just think superduo... and look to see what colors I had available in them. Point made and taken... I really knew my way around the old system!!
Enter Phase 4 of Insanity.... Don't fix what isn't broken!
Yup, that about sum's it up!! I spent the next three to four days resorting my stash back into piles of types and sizes of beads, so that I could put things back the way they were when I began this journey, and I have been a completely happy camper ever since!!
What's the moral of this story? There are several.
First, Don't be afraid to try and explore something new, because you never know when a new method will hit the nail on the head and turn out to be the perfect solution to a dilemma!
Second, Learn to listen to your little voices, they will rarely lead you astray!
Third, Don't fix what isn't broken, and
Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, Figure out what works for you as an individual and stick with it!!
Have you ever taken a journey that led you right back to the place where you began?? :)
