Thrifty Find ~ A Spinnable, Liftable, Wonderful Paint Caddy!

I would love to call this item a wonderful gift, but it was more like a necessity.  I love working on art in both graphite and paint.  Although my graphite work had been put on the back burner in order to stock my Etsy store, I have been slowly stealing a few hours here and there this week back at the drafting table.  Well... that's if I could find the table.  It was loaded down with acrylic paints.  Aaaargh!  And worse than that, they have to be taken off the table and some go into craft drawers while others go into a big plastic store bag.   So when a painting project needs to be worked on, I spend most of my time digging out the necessary colors.  Talk about a waste of time! :(  Take it from me... Lack of organization can kill motivation!

This struggle over space has plagued me for about a year.   The problem was always  forgotten about, until the need to do a switch between the two art forms arose.  Then, it would drive me up the wall!  Lucky for me, there was a craft site that had some wooden paint boxes that I stumbled across while looking for tole books.  This set my mind to thinking about my space and storage dilemma.  After quite a bit of searching on the Internet,  I could not find a solution that made me happy and was within my budget.  So with that hopeless feeling in my heart, my last attempt was to search eBay... where this sweet little item presented itself.  Yay!

This rack (which I believe is made by Provo) spins completely around, can be picked up and moved by its handle, and holds 160 bottles of 2 oz. paint!  Yippee! :)  No more bag to trip over on the floor.  No more struggling with heavy bins filled to the top.  No more digging... and all of my paints at my fingertips with colors easily seen!  * insert celestial music here* ;)

So here is my little life saver.  After being a ceramic artist for over 20 years, I have a love for their acrylic lines.  So, on one side is my old comfortable stand by colors.  With the row and a half that they didn't fill, my special acrylic additives had a place to go. :)  What a thrill it was to pull all my paints out and organize them!

Then came my craft paints.  I have grown very fond of many of these colors but dreaded digging through the bag  to find them.  Now look at them?  It makes the colors so easy to view.  Another bonus was getting a good look at my inventory.  There were a few colors that needed to be replaced! 

I was able to do some work on my graphite drawing last night and did NOT need to clean my table.  Got up this morning and worked on my mini gourds... jumped back and forth with my paint brands with a simple spin of the rack.  What can I say?  I am in heaven! :)