I am not an artist. Not by any stretch of the imagination, but my fly tying room could use a little life…and organization. I have one of the back bedrooms in our house which, to my face, my wife calls the “hunting room. Surely behind my back and to her girlfriends, she calls it much something derogatory. The closet is filled with camoflague, hunting packs, longjohns, and waders. The one corner has a mixture of fly rods and arrows haphazardly leaning against the wall. The spare bed is pilled high with an assortment of camping, hunting, and fishing gear. I am pretty proud of the library that I have in there. Anything from Hunter S. Thompson to Walt Prothero and Ivan Turgenev to John Gierarch. As icing on the cake, the 8 foot table that serves as a fly tying table and general dumping ground from a weekend afield is usually pilled high with foam, fur, and feathers that is almost impossible to tie on anymore.
Long story short, I know it’s a mess. A happy mess, but a disaster none the less. So I decided to put a peg board on the wall to better organize myself. Then I thought. Why not give the room some color.
I realized as I started to put up different tying material on the peg board, that I have a lot of “stuff.” And when my wife walked in to check on my progress, she noticed commented that I had a lot of “stuff.”
Great idea- likin the execution! Oh an dang! you have a lot of stuff :-). Mike
Thanks Mike. But dont say that too loud. I have just enough…
Ben
Hey Ben, great idea and looking good!
Thanks Howard. Its working out so far.
Ben
I say if you are going to do it, do it right! Looking good to me. Don’t get too organized though, you will never be able to find anything!
Thanks Mel. I know what you mean about being too organized.
Ben
Be grateful for a “hunting room”. In our small two bedroom apartment my fly tying desk is in our living room right next to the TV, and most of our gear is stashed in the baby’s closet and on the wall in our bedroom (kayaks in master suites are the new thing – don’t ya know).
Love what you did though. Fly tying stuff is inherintly a pain to organize. I still see a lot of extra space on that peg board though, and if your wife ever asks: you DEFINITELY need more stuff. You never know when that new color of foam is going to come in handy!
Thanks for the heads up Kirk. Its been very easy to fill the rest of the board up. It is very difficult for me to get out of the fly shop without picking up something new. Thanks for the kind words.
Ben
Dude, you don’t have a lot of stuff! I have more crap than that in just one cabinet! My wife doen’t say anything anymore as it is just words, width no meaning to me. I know I have a lot of crap. Keep on tying and fishing and hunting and you will have 5 times that in a few years. Trust me!
Thanks for the encouragement Juan. Anytime you need to get rid of some of that crap, Ill pay shipping. The trick now is to keep my wife out if that room so she doesn’t see how much more I buy.
Ben
Love the artistic touch on the pegboard! It will be a shame to cover the fish up with all your stuff! ;o)
Thanks mom. I kind of fell in with the spray paint and should have held off a bit. Now I have to cover it up so that you cant see e mistakes. Love you.
Ben
Nice! Before/after pics are always fun. Looks great!
Thanks Erin. Slowly but surely I’m getting organized.
Ben
Great idea! I’ve seen a handful of tying tables, but never one with the peg board. I like it. Most I’ve seen have their stuff crammed in drawers. That’s how mine is, and it ends up all over the table and floor to keep it “accessible”. If I ever get an area big enough to call my hunting/fishing area, I’m definitely stealing your idea. Thanks for sharing!