Some ideas on how to store and organise your embroidery stash!

In this video I show you some ways that I store my embroidery stash! I go through some different ideas and when is a good idea to use what including some ideas for small storage spaces and how to keep your stash permanently neat and tidy. Check out the links below for places to buy storage items and my Instagram and Facebook pages for pictures of my storage in situ!

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00:00 - Intro
02:42 - Threads
20:39 - Fabrics
22:59 - Kits
28:11 - All the small things
30:08 - Hoops & frames
31:44 - Finished and vintage embroideries
34:34 - Books & magazines
36:53 - Odds & ends

Marie Kondo books
The Life Changing Magic of Tidying
Joy at work, Organising your professional Life
Spark Joy

Where to get storage solutions:
US
The Container Store - Baskets, boxes, shelves and loads more!
Elizabeth Ward Bead storage - Google for you rnearest stockist, available on Amazon
Michaels - Small storage ideas

UK
The Range for various plastic, card, and leather storage boxes and drawers (my green drawers came from here!).
The Works - For small plastic and wooden storage ideas
Dunhelm - Baskets, boxes and drawer units
Hobby Craft - Small storage ideas

Rest of the world
Ikea - King of storage solutions! Book shelves, drawer units desk organisers. Check the Market Place for boxes, magazine racks, baskets, drawers, pots, shelving etc. Don't forget to check out kitchen area for some good ideas too (shelf and drawer dividers are good!).

If you have somewhere in your country that is good for storage ideas please let me know and I'll update the list!

On a budget?
Charity Shops/Goodwill Stores for tins, baskets and decorative boxes
Save boxes from deliveries, cover them with paper and decorate!
Chocolate and biscuit boxes and tins
Takeaway plastic boxes

Are you an embroidery beginner? Or thinking about how to get into the hobby? Go to the 'Beginning Embroidery' page on my website to learn more:

Like this video and subscribe to the channel for more hand embroidery tutorials.

Hand embroidery for beginners and experts!

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[manicangel]

I never know what I like more...the art of doing a hobby or the collecting of the supplies because that in -and-of-itself is a hobby lol..

[penkast]

Thank you for sharing your system, Sarah! Have a wonderful weekend, and don’t pay attention to people who get mad over anything you say or do. You are such a wonderful teacher and a kind soul! I’ve learned so much from you and look forward to your videos every week.

[lucihedley]

Hi Sara, writing to you from rural Queensland Aust. Thank you for your videos, You don't realise how much you influence people. I am over 70 and was educated in a girls college - sewing was a big thing, and I hated it. Not any longer. I look in thrift shops and pick up unfinished embroidery kits for very little. I always felt the fabric, mostly linen, around the finished cloth, such a waste. Consequently, I have always kept the larger pieces. I have even pulled threads to darn / repair some pieces for other people. However, after watching just one of your clips, I have created book covers for diaries, bibles, address books etc. Such fun. But the greatest thing - for me, was making a needle book. It has all of my needles together in one place. Now, instead of digging through my pin box looking for a needle, I have my go to little book. I will write to you again with other things I have done thanks to you. Have a happy and safe holiday period.

[marywiggins]

I love it that you are organized, but not super fussy about it.

[mojow]

If you want a portable container for a project- a fishing tackle box is quite good with its small compartments at the top and larger space at the bottom. I've had mine for years and find it really handy. Thanks for all the advice on storage -- thread and material seem to multiply all by themselves.

[StaceyBlanton-yx]

I wish I had watched this before putting all my floss on the bobbins. I will remember this going forward. Thanks!!

[theagraceful]

I was born organized!! That said, I have been known to overdo it a bit. Love your stacked box idea! I have learned so much from watching your wonderful videos! Want to give a big shout out to your husband who does such a terrific job with all the filming, etc. You make a great teaching team.

[sherryzimmerman]

Had so much to say…, but so glad I read the other comments as they they pretty much hit the points I wanted to say……thank you so much for your gracious style of presentation……you have kept so many of us at different levels, budget, room availability…..from the organized to the wanna bees…..who just seem to run out of steam…..I appreciate your “all are welcomed” P.S. your nail color is perfect for this time of year….

[SdW.]

Thanks for sharing, Sarah!!!
I'm a young woman in a fly tying group and the fellas showed me that old pill boxes (the kind for each day of the week), are great for small beads, etc.

[paperwhistletv]

You’re a delight. Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us so generously.

[heather]

Hi Sarah! Great to see another video. I love seeing how people organize their stuff.

I am a serial crafter, so I have TONS of things. TONS. So, in my longest YouTube comment ever, I’d like to share what I do to keep everything as organized as possible. I’ll break it into crafting categories so that the list isn’t too crazy to understand.

Embroidery/Cross-stitch: I have two of those plastic bins with the dividers and wound-up embroidery
floss on the little cards. One bin is for warm tones the other cool tones. For the ones that are not wound
up, I have re-useable, see through, zippered bags that have my flosses divided by color. I also have a
large bag for my specialty flosses/threads, but I really need to organize those better and now that I
know about the gold changing colors, I seriously need to re-do that bag! I also have a nice flat but
longish tin from DMC that the sparkly threads came in. I’ve kept them in that tin.

My hoops are all laid flat in a large plastic storage bin, along with my sketch book for ideas, tracing
paper, iron, and my completed projects. I have small clear storage containers, inside the large one, that
hold my large needles and other little things that might come in handy. Most of my stuff, that I use
regularly, is stored in a black zippered bag that I got off Amazon. It holds all my stuff well. I love it.
My cotton fabrics are rolled up and stored inside plastic, stackable shoe bins. The fronts are see through so I know what’s in each bin. My aida fabrics are in a small drawer, along with my cross-stitch kits that I will probably never do… I should go through those.

Needle felting: I’m bringing this one up because Sarah mentioned wool thread. I needle felt and have a
lot of wool. A couple things I’ve learned is that Lavender keeps the creepy crawlies away. I have a little
organza bag with dried lavender in it that I tossed into my large plastic, zippered storage bag where I
keep all my wools. Each wool is in a plastic bag that I try to push all the air out and throw in a little silica
gel pack to soak up any moisture. I bought a bag of silica gel packs off Amazon, then a month later found them at the Dollar Store. Ugh. The last thing I will say about my needle felting organization is that I store needles in 2 ways. 1. In the little plastic tubes they came in, or 2. With their tips poked into tiny corks so that I don’t stab myself or break the needle tips. (My embroidery needles are in small, square, plastic containers.)

Jewelry Making/Beads: Recently, while cleaning out my grandpa’s house, I found a fishing tackle box
that had never been used. I painted it a pretty color and now I keep all my little jewelry making things in
it: wire, chain, clips, hooks, clasps, earring things, etc. I bought tiny glass jars with screw on lids for my
plastic earring backs from the Dollar Store in a pack of 4 or 5. I also keep little plastic bags that things
come in when I order something online, and re-use them to put all my small things in. The tackle box is
wonderful. I have a lot of stuff in there and it’s still not full. It latches closed and has a handle.
My beads are in several of the plastic containers like my embroidery flosses, as well as bags, tubes, and
Tic-Tac dispensers!

Other tips or info: Children’s pencil boxes are wonderful, especially when they go on sale. I grabbed
several of them (for under a dollar each!) in different colors that I’ve put my nail art tools and
decorations in. Or, like Sarah found in Jonathan’s man cave, tool storage is great! There are the bins for
nails/screws that have all the little drawers you can pull out. That would make a great bead storage or
any little things. Maybe even embroidery floss if the drawers are long enough.

Thrift shops, second-hand, yard sales, and store sales are the best times/places to buy all your stuff. Most of my embroidery threads came from a girl that had bought a lot of them for bracelet making and then got bored of it and was going to throw it away. She was much happier to give it to me for FREE!!!. Amazing.


MY FAVORITE “hack” for crafting is having a small trash can on my desk. I made one out of an old
food container and painted it so that it doesn’t look like a food container. I kept the lid so that I can
close it if/when my cats come around and decide to investigate everything. It’s so handy to have the
little trash can for tiny scraps of fabric, the ends of my threads, broken needles, whatever I need to
throw away, and keep my work area clean!

I’ll stop there, but I could go on for ages. I haven’t even touched on my paints, clay, pyrography,
dioramas, drawing/coloring, sewing, or office supplies. I have a very small space and obviously too many arts and crafts, so organization is key.

Off to read the other ideas in the comments!! :) (Not sure why the spacing came out all funny, looked fine when I wrote it and when I try to edit it.)

[doreen]

Thank you. I had no idea on how to organize the things that I inherited.

[julied]

Great ideas. I’m very motivated to go and sort out my supplies. Thanks.

[rebeccajourney]

God bless you for doing this! I have watched several by other flosstubers but I jumped to see what you had to say on the subject. You are so knowledgeable and helpful Sarah! Thank you so much!

I was taught to sew by my mom when I was very young. I'm so fortunate to have had such an amazing patient mother! 60 years later and I'm still stitching🪡

[melanie]

I use my husbands old cigar boxes for storing threads lol. They are wooden and pretty.

[nadakodsia]

It's always a pleasure to see you my beautiful lady, thank you for all the ideas and thoughts that you shared with us with generosity... 🌷🙏

[nataliemulina]

Thank you Sarah! I’ve tried different ways of keeping my embroidery items🪡 The crucial criteria for me is how fast I can find smth I need, so I use clear boxes mostly.
I liked your idea of using a ring to keep mouline for a particular project. ❤
P. S. I’m writing this comment having a candle near me and hoping mobile internet will be enough to send it. Your videos help to survive 🇬🇧🇺🇦

[frommybluedesk]

Oh my gosh, I am from your area! I got rid of a lot of my craft books and took them to my local library as it happens, it was a few years ago but they were very happy to receive them. I love books and still have a few but remind myself to go to the library in the first instance if I need one, I’ve saved myself a lot of money, disappointment & clutter by doing so - Nottinghamshire library service is wonderful because we can check the catalogue and have any book from any library in the county sent to our local one for 30p, now that is value for money. Thank you for your great videos ❤

[farrenrohana]

I bought a ton of goldwork stuff and it's been in plastic bags for months. YIKES! After I got over my mini heart attack, lol, when you mentioned not keeping them in plastic I was thinking I should get them out asap and wondered if parchment paper is acid free. I Google it and it is, so I now have a project for today making bags for my goldwork stuff. Thanks so much for this tip. I have quite an expensive selection it would suck if they all tarnished. I do a lot of different arts and crafts including embroidery, crochet, polymer clay, painting on fabric and canvases, beading for jewelry making, etc etc etc. I've been trying to organize and sort for quite awhile now.
My hoops are hanging on nails on the wall.
😮‍💨
😉👍

[susie]

Before watching this I hadn’t even thought of moths attacking my wool or embroidery silks so have now reorganised my stash. Although I started embroidery by being given a box of carded silks from someone who had given up the hobby, I now keep new ones in the skeins ( thanks to you again!). I thought storing them in plastic bags in colours is a good idea and whilst looking for a storage idea for the bags I found an old cantilever sewing box in an auction. It needs some restoration but I’m enjoying putting my limited creative talents to use on that.