the jewelry organizer, in progress

I'm glad I was finally able to get this started, since I'd been saying for years that I needed to do this! And it's pretty obvious why...

Yes, this is what my jewelry collection currently looks like. Scary, isn't it? It's frustrating-- not only does it make it impossibly difficult to get the necklaces out that I want, or to find a matching pair of earrings, but I've also had a lot of jewelry that I've broken from having to store them in the two boxes like this and then trying to get them out. And conventional jewelry boxes just don't cut it for me--not enough slots or pegs!.

I've never really been a fancy jewelry girl. I'll gladly take a funky beaded piece of jewelry over an expensive precious gemstone any day. (Ok, I'll make an exception for semiprecious--they often come in the form of funky beads! And two of my favorite necklaces in my collection are moonstone and green amber, respectively.) Honestly, if I ever manage to get engaged, I don't even want a diamond ring. It's just not me--everybody does it, and I like color. (That, and watching Blood Diamond pretty much killed any desire I'd have to own one.) I guess it also helps that I can make the funky beaded jewelry myself! But of course that means I ended up with a lot of it.

Anyway, I finally finished the first "page" of my new jewelry organizer, and here's the pics.
Nothing fancy-- just two rectangles of pieced-together muslin with pockets sewn on, and another strip of muslin sewn on the side with buttonholes to put the rings through. The rings themselves are just cheap binder rings from Staples. I'm going to make a book "cover" at some point with something I can fold over the top to keep those first couple of rows of jewelry in.
And here's the close-up. I'm sorting the necklaces and their matching earrings in the same pocket. I'm going to have a lot of earrings that don't have matching necklaces, and I'm still trying to figure out what exactly to do with them-- I've had an idea in my mind for some time now for an earring tree, but I'll have to see if I can make it work. (Meaning I need to find some wire sturdy enough to build it from, but pliable enough that I can actually bend it.) But I think this is a pretty good start-- I was able to fit nine necklaces on each side! I won't get that many with all the pages, since I'll need to make some with larger pockets for larger pendants or beads. It looks very homemade, but I'm ok with that-- it's kind of charming, I think, and I like the idea that I'm able to use up muslin scraps and mostly used-up spools of thread and bobbins that I'd otherwise be throwing out. (The thread on the bobbins, anyway.) Plus that will make it really easy to keep adding to it-- I'm sure I'm going to have to keep making muslins for garments!