Chatter and a Card

Chatter

Someone asked what flower punch I used on the second card on this card. It's from StampinUp.

Someone else who shall remain nameless (okay, it was Marty!) sent me a RAK. The package included a stamp I almost bought a month ago but didn't because a little voice whispered in my ear that someone really nice would send it to me soon. You'll see it on a card soon. Marty also sent me a Crop-A-Dile corner rounder that is absolutely the coolest corner rounder ever! Be still, my heart. I don't deserve friends-I've-never-even-met-in-real-life who are this kind and generous!

Someone else entirely asked about my stamp index, which I referred to in a recent post. This subject--my stamp index--is a source of grave frustration to me. I've had four iterations of index since I started stamping. Not one has met all my needs.

Below is a picture of the THREE binders that housed my Version 4.0 index. The pink binder houses Papertrey stamp images. The brown binder contains Mark's Finest and StampinUp images, as well as a punch index. The green binder holds Hero Arts images, as well as images from miscellaneous companies. 

Three binders. They are pretty colors, but three binders are two too many and not easily portable. One thing I love to do with my index is take it with me when I travel. Plus, dividing everything by manufacturer seems artificial, especially when today's card is so very representative of how I work: mix and match. So I'm reworking the index and will share the new one when I'm done, which at the rate I'm going should be sometime in the year 2020.

I have a lot of stamps.

Still, it won't really take until 2020 to finish because I'm obsessive.

But you knew that.

Didn't you?

Sure you did.

A Card

As you can see, I combined a sentiment from Papertrey's Mega Mixed Messages with a flower stamp from StampinUp's Happy Harmony set, thus proving my point about the silliness of segregating stamps in my index.

The ground on this is washi tape, and I--SURPRISE--actually like the tape on this card, which was vaguely inspired by a card I received from Krystie Lee. Her card is much prettier, but as I have it and will not show it to you, my card will not suffer in comparison...unless you scroll down her blog and find an aqua, orange, and celery one-layer card with a button on one flower and a sheer white ribbon around the bottom.

Her card, however, has no bling.

So there.

Of Thank You Notes and Reorganization

Now that Christmas is over, it's time to think about thank you notes. Today, the boys and I will write a bunch of them. Some I've made over the last year are Christmas-themed, but those I've made in the last few weeks are not. Like this one, which uses a lamp from the Hero Arts Decorative Lamp set.

I can't remember exactly what green ink I used (maybe VersaMagic Tea Leaves...a dreamy green!), but the purply color is Boysenberry VersaColor, which is almost a dead ringer for SU's razzleberry. I wanted a table to ground the lamp but didn't want the bulk of a knot or bow added to what is already a double-dimensional card, so I wrapped SU dotted razzleberry ribbon flat around a popped panel. The lines of the grosgrain mimic the lines in the lamp shade, which is, of course, popped up. The card is 4.25" square, the sentiment is from PTI's anniversary set Round and Round, and the raised panel is 3" square.

Blithering about Reorganization...

I read Joan B's description of getting her supplies organized into her new Scrapbox on her blog here. This, combined with a revived confessional thread on SCS about people having too many supplies and a new thread by a woman who is putting herself on a stamp-supply spending freeze, and I felt uncontrollably motivated to reorganize my craft room. You see, my room's been looking cluttered lately, and my AR/OC self is feeling weighted down by that. I want to start the new year with a clean, tidy, organized room.

I spent about three hours yesterday going through stuff, condensing, and I'm not quite finished. You see, two years ago, when I resolved to use every image stamp I own (still ongoing and a very good resolution!), I also resolved not to buy any craft supplies I didn't really need. I focused my buying on replacing consummables I loved (self-adhesive gemstones, especially, and PTI white cardstock) and the occasional punch, as well as project-specific supplies. For stamps, I limited my spending to birthday and Christmas money, which, given the generosity of my family, has been more than sufficient.

As I used up some supplies, I didn't replace them. Ribbon, for instance. Two years ago, I used ribbon on virtually every card I made, so I bought it gleefully. (Unfortunately, now I don't use ribbon on cards nearly as often...though obviously judging from today's card, it's still a player.) Back then, I had 9 glass jars and two photo boxes full of ribbon. I mean FULL. Yesterday, without purging any ribbon at all, I eliminated the two photoboxes. The jars are still fairly full, but that's what I call progress.

My plan is to use up as much of my ribbon stash as possible and then start buying silk ribbon, which seems so much more sensible for cards as it results in flatter bows and knots. Unfortunately, until I use up most of what I have, I must resist the temptation.

I also have given away or donated a bunch of stuff in my quarterly purges. The result of all this fiscal responsibility was loose storage...drawers that were half-full and boxes that had just a few things left in them. Hence, the need to condense. Plus, the room had just become cluttered and messy, with random things stuffed in odd places.

It's already much improved, and I only have about an hour of work left. Obviously, any 12' x 10' room requiring over four hours to reorganize represents a serious mental illness. Okay, well, a mild one, at least. It also shows how incredibly blessed I am to have easy access to supplies and the means to purchase such a hoard without resorting to credit cards. It helps to have a husband with even more expensive hobbies so I need not feel guilty about all this stuff.

For two years, I've been heading in the right direction toward balancing possession and usefulness, and that's a resolution it seems I can stick to.

What are your crafting resolutions this year?

Evidence of Obsession

I've showed most of my craft room to you but have yet to share my stamp storage, largely because it represents the biggest annoyance of conflicting feelings in the entire room. You see, I would rather spend money on stamps than on storage, but my storage is an ugly hodge-podge of drawer units. See.


Sigh.

[Those of you with sharp eyes will notice two empty drawers. I plan for the future.]

These drawers are the most efficient, cost-effective way to store loose stamps and Hero Arts sets, of which I have quite a few. Each drawer has a theme, such as Cooking/House, Thank You, Birthday, Non-Christmas Holidays, SU Animal Sets, Block Flowers, etc. I love how I can pull a whole drawer out and take it to my desk if I'm not sure what I want to stamp.

This is my Leaf drawer:


And my Tree drawer:


StampinUp floral sets fit nicely on end in one of the deep drawers because I have too many of them for the flat drawers:


Wow. My non-SU animal/insect drawer is a mess, isn't it? Sorry about that.


Here are some shadow stamps:


And here are some more shadow stamps:


This drawer has sayings and quotations:


This entire six-drawer unit is full of Christmas stamps:


See:


See:


See. I think you get the point. I have a lot of Christmas stamps.


My PTI, Hero Arts, and Mark's Finest Papers stamp sets are in CD holders on top of the plastic units. Each is grouped by manufacturer, and then subcategorized by whatever system seems most useful for the particulars of that manufacturer. I also occasionally include the clear sets with the loose stamps in the drawers when the whole set applies to a category there. For instance, Birthday Basics from PTI is in the Birthday Drawer.


This little stack is new stuff I haven't played with yet. Don't you love that tree? It's from Hero Arts. I've had my eye on it for a while and found it on sale last week at Michael's. Yippy!



Every four to six months I completely reorganize my stamps. From the messiness of some drawers, it's obvious that I'll be reorganizing soon. If I ever hit upon the perfect system, I'll be sure to share in detail, but frankly, I believe there is no perfect system. It's just fun to move them all about every once in a while.

No. I'm not AR/OC.

Well, maybe just a little bit.

Punch Drunk

Because of my mild obsessive-compulsive disorder, I like organization. In fact, I like everything about organization, from finding the perfect storage (cheap, efficient, not ugly) to keeping track of my many little supplies with inventories. It's a great thing to do when the muse isn't whispering in one's ear.

Take, for instance, my punch storage. The three white drawers are from Target, and I about went postal assembling the thing with its tiny, tiny screws. No more of those, thank you very much. Plastic drawers droop annoyingly under the weight of punches, so they fail to pass muster as well. Then, I found these stackable baskets at Target. Angels sang when I read the price of them (very affordable!), and the cute little handles flip in so you can stack them. It's mildly annoying to UNstack them to get at punches in the lower baskets, but it's better than the alternatives I've tried.

Now, the circle and square punches are in the white drawers, and all the others are sorted into baskets by theme, such as leaves/trees, flora, hearts and stars, and borders. Although where in the world does my Martha Stewart cupcake punch belong? None of my categories really fits it. And this bothers me.

I'm sure you're not interested in my bothers, so let's move on to my punch inventory. This is not ideal, either, but it works. At least, it does when it's up-to-date and I remember to take it to the store when I need to buy punches.


Since I was too tired to stamp today, I updated the punch inventory. This lead me to the realization that I have purchased a lot of punches lately. I don't seem to be able to control myself. I'm BINGING on punches.


I won't show you all the pages, simply because I don't want you to know just how punch drunk I am. Just believe that there are a lot of them, and let's move right along to a card that USES a punch.


I'm deeply annoyed by the fact that subtle colors don't photograph well. Or perhaps it's just that I don't photograph them well enough to do them justice. But really, this card is far more intersting in real life. And you can read the sentiment well, too. For the record, it's hi there .

Sigh.

And here's a question for you. If one can be punch drunk, can one have a punch hangover? If so, I think I have one. Just as long as I don't wake up with Mike Tyson's tiger in my bathroom and a tooth missing, it'll all be okay.

Right?

Supplies
stamps: PTI Day at the Beach, Mixed Messages
ink: VersaColor
paper: PTI white
accessories: square punch, dimensionals

A Mess and a Very Clean Ornament

Some people seem to have the mistaken impression that my craft area is all, like, you know, CLEAN all the time. Here's what it looked like yesterday afternoon:

Still think I'm hopelessly AR/OCD? Of course not. I tell you in all honesty that I'm only a LITTLE BIT AR/OCD. Years of living with my DH, aka "Pig Pen" have had their effect. Here's the proof.

The details of this mess would take a year to explain, so I'll just point out that what looks like harvest candy corn in the foreground (near the purple marvy punch) is, indeed, candy corn. Sugar-flavored wax is one of my many bad habits, but I don't like the fake chocolate flavored ones in the mix. That's why those are still sitting on my desk this morning, along with the rest of this mess.

Out of all this chaos and sugar rush came this shadowbox ornament:



Be still, my heart! Wouldn't a set of these make the perfect accompaniment for the Ode to Holly card? Of course it would! I'll just make sure to use the same textured CS for the ornaments and curl up the edges of the holly. Happy sigh.

I'm going to post a tutorial on these later this week, after I manage to buy some decent straight square punches. My stash contains the Creative Memories punches for 3/4", 1", 1 1/4", and 1 1/2". Until now, I've been happy with them, but they don't punch deeply enough into the paper to work for this technique, so I had to cut this square by hand with a quilt ruler and craft knife.

You can imagine how this irritated me.

Must. Make. It. Easier!

And then I'll share. Isn't it just so CAS?!?

Craft Room, Part 3

So far, I've showed you my baker's rack and main work desk, so now it's time to look under the desk and to the right. First, under the desk:



All my punches are stored under the desk in a hodge-podge of storage. The three white laminate drawers are from Target. What a pain to put together! That holds my circle, square, and oval punches in a whole bunch of sizes. On top are oversized tag and border punches, my Bind-It-All, and office three-hole punch. The green photo box holds odd punches, like corner punches, slot, slit, and word window. The sterilite drawers hold all the other punches (flowers, leaves, snowflakes, mittens, stars, hearts, etc.).

Beside the punches are my magazines. The only ones I keep are the last full year, plus the current year. So I'll clear out 2008 in a few months and start collecting 2010.

To the right of my desk are more sterilite storage units. The little drawers on the left hold sharpies and bic mark-its, sorted by color. On top of that is my bulging prismacolor pencil holder. The set of larger drawers in the middle hold stamping accessories (sponges, stipple brushes) coloring media, embossing supplies, chalks, acrylic paints, and (oddly enough) BIA wires.



The stack of drawers on the right is scrapbooking-specific stamps and alphabets. I know, I know. I have a lot of alphabets. The clear stamps are in the CD case on top. The green photo case holds all my reinkers.

This sort of organized storage compensates for my absentminded brain. Keeping all the "like" supplies together has helped me actually use my supplies, rather than hoard and forget. For example, on those occasions when I want to color something in, I check all the coloring supplies and take my pick. Sometimes, I think I want one thing and end up stumbling across something else that works better. This rarely happened when my stuff was all spread out in several rooms and in boxes.

I'd love to hear of other organizational strategies that have worked well for you, especially if you're absentminded like I am. Being mildly AR/OCD (please stop laughing...I can hear you!), I'm always curious about how other people organize their "collections." Yeah, that's what we'll call them. Collections of supplies.

Craft Room, Part 2

Since I can't possibly follow yesterday's delicious CASness with anything close to that perfect, today we're looking at my work area. This way, when you see my Ode to Holly card, you won't think, "Awwww, poor thing! She's really lost her touch." Instead, you will think, "Thank god she's posting a card!"

I'm a strategic blogger that way.

As you might suspect, I have a lot of ink, all of which is stored in Sterilite drawers in two towers on either side of my very large plastic folding table. Here's the left tower.

I store my frequently used supplies (glues and tapes, scrap paper, cut card bases, post-its and masks) here. The bottom drawer is a place to put projects when I get stuck. I put them away and will go back to them later and either throw them away, recycle them, or finish them.

Memories and Ancient Page inks are stored in the middle three drawers. These inks are sort of weird but I bought a bunch of them very early in my stamping career, before I knew better, and virtually all of them are still juicy seven years later, so I can't complain. They are archival, waterproof dye inks, which makes them perfect for stamping on scrapbook pages. But I CANNOT watercolor with them...the whole waterproof thing gets in the way for me. They also don't work with clear stamps very well.

The right tower is totally dedicated to inks. Stacked on top are Colorbox pigment inks (barely visible). The next three drawers are VersaColor, VersaMagic, Brilliance, and Colorbox chalk inks. These are all great inks for stamping with clear stamps, and all but the Colorbox chalk inks are archival and thus safe for scrapping. I have a lot of these in small pads (dew drops, cubes, cat eyes) which are great for rocking and rolling.

The next five drawers down are StampinUp inks. I have most of the 48 colors, some neutrals and in colors, and a pad of craft white. SU classic ink isn't archival or waterproof, but it is great for watercoloring and coordinating with the SU paper. The bottom drawer holds black and chocolate inks (Palette, StazOn, VersaColor, Memento), spectrum pads, and odd-ball inks that don't belong anyplace else.

I counted once. I have close to three hundred pads, large and small. I'm not going to think about that fact. Ever.

The rest of my workspace looks like this:

The shelf has my ribbon jars (which lately haven't seen much use but will come around again, I assure you). I don't wrap my ribbon around clothespins or anything. I just wrap it neatly around my fingers and shove it in. It's never tangled (I do clean them out a couple times a year), I can see what I have at a glance, and it looks so pretty, doesn't it?

The two photo boxes behind the ribbon hold narrow satin rolls, sheer rolls, and miscellaneous "specialty" ribbon, as well as needles for sewing buttons and book binding and such.

I stack my quilting rulers on the left, along with a little index of all my inks and punches. The yellow, orange, and green flower pots hold pens, small tools, and scissors. Aren't they the cutest! Those colors will cheer me up this winter for sure, and the pots were only 50 cents a piece on sale at Hobby Lobby. I couldn't NOT buy them.

The white tray holds my acrylic blocks and Making Memories magnetic stamp handles. Those MM magnetic stamps seemed like such a good idea at the time, but in truth, they are a pain in my tookus. Don't buy them unless you are really, really patient. I really should move those off my desk. Haven't used them in a couple of years.

The baby wipe tote holds a damp washcloth for cleaning stamps, and under it is my Ultra clean stamp cleaning pad for stubborn stains.

That sounds like a laundry detergent commercial.

The small stack of six drawers on the right holds archival pens for scrapbooking, such as Zig writers and Micron pens, sorted by color. Of course, my SU markers are on top of that, along side a flower pot that holds...drum roll please...deco scissors. Yes, I've kept them and am not afraid to use them!

Please feel free to ask questions about anything you see in these pictures that I've not covered or that you want to see more closely. I've been stamping for close to eight years now, and that's a lot of time to collect and develop quirky ways to do things. Next time we visit my craft room, I show you what all's under the desk. Woohoo! Bet you can't wait!

Craft Room, Part 1

My craft room is a small bedroom, which is a huge improvement over the unfinished basement where I did my crafting when we first moved to this house. I called my basement space the Dungeon. The upstairs bedroom, however, has soft lavender paint on the walls, sheer white curtains, and a noticeable lack of spiders. Much better.

Today, we'll focus on paper and embellishment storage, which centers around a baker's rack loaded with plastic storage:



The top shelf contains my 8.5 x 11 paper, which is mostly StampinUp and Papertrey. There are also five Cropper Hopper 7 x 12 accordion storage folders that hold stickers, alpha stickers, dp scraps, and cardstock scraps.



The second shelf (cut off in the photo) holds my stamp inventories, in those pretty pink, brown, and green binders. The Create binder is mainly scrapbooking ideas (haven't opened it in months, sadly), and the others are photo albums and a scrapbook. The drawers on this shelf hold cutting tools, transparencies, waxed paper, and other miscellaneous stuff.

The third shelf holds patterned paper sorted by theme and color and brand in a complicated system that works for me in the small Cropper Hopper holders. Cardstock is in the larger holders, sorted by smooth/textured and arranged by color.



The bottom section holds four 3-drawer, 12 x 12 sterilite drawer units that represent the most brilliant organization strategy I've ever used. All my embellisments (except ribbon) are in these drawers, sorted by COLOR.



Here's the blue drawer. Isn't that beautiful? Everything that's blue is here: glitter, flock, flowers, brads, buttons, stickles, thread, whatever. I use a combination of bead storage boxes and other containers to sort everything neatly.



There are drawers for the six rainbow colors, metallic embellishments, and neutrals (white, black, brown, cream). Chipboard gets its own drawer since I can make it any color I want.

Here's the Metallic drawer. The containers holding things are bead storage boxes. I like this better than the tins that Hodgepodge came in because I can see things more easily. Of course, I hardly ever use this stuff anyway. But hey, I will...one day.



Sorting by color was scary at first, but I've been a long-time fan of Stacy Julian, the founding editor of the sadly defunct Simple Scrapbooks magazine. She swears by her own color storage system, and I felt like I wasn't using my stuff like I could, and I would forget I had things until after I made pages or cards and would say, "Oh, this would have been perfect!"

I don't say that any more. Everything is easy to find, easy to coordinate, and easy to see at a glance.

Over the next few weeks, I'll show more of my space. But tomorrow, I'm getting back to cards. And on Friday...a purge give-away, as promised!