Stamp Room Progress

 

Hello, stamping friends!  Today I'm just going to pop in with a little stamp room show and tell.  This may take more than a minute, so I hope you have some time, but I also hope you'll enjoy the read as you can probably relate to some of it.  Or maybe you've got more self control than I do.

 

If I had one of those "dream rooms" these pictures would be a lot more amazing, but, in fact, it's a very small room and it hasn't felt very pretty or special to me for a long time.  It held too many supplies for its size, and all of it was contained in mismatched, hand-me-down furniture and shelving.  I couldn't walk without bumping into something, and if I pulled something from a shelf I had no place to set it down.  I felt closed in, especially with a window too high on the wall for a view unless I picked and tripped my way through the obstacle course and peered over the sill on tiptoes.

 

I came to a point where I decided that my little play room was important enough to get some special attention so it could be a happier place.  Earlier this month I shared a little bit about the ribbon organization.  Today it's buttons, papers, and stamps.  We'll start with the buttons.

 

I don't use buttons very often, but I do love them.  Most of my buttons were inherited from my Mom.  How many of you have inherited button collections?  My buttons were all over the place -- in a drawer, a box, a jar, a chest -- anyplace I could find a spot to tuck them in.  Many were still on their original cards and the loose buttons more often than not had thread and fabric attached from having been snipped from discarded garments.  I painstakingly, tediously removed all the thread and fabric, pried or snipped others off their cards, and sorted into color groups.  I gave away all the shank buttons, and there were quite a few.  Sitting on a cabinet at eye level in their cute little jars, they make a colorful decorative accent for the room.

 

 

Next comes the paper, very near and dear to my heart.  I gave it its own organized, neat and tidy, uncrowded cabinet.  This cabinet (pictured below) contains all my designer paper, 12x12 textured cardstock, and assorted whites for stamping on.  The whites are bottom shelf, sorted in drawers.  The white scraps go right back into their designated drawers.

 

The 12x12 cardstock is sorted by color.  This is Bazzill textured only.  All those clips you see on the 12x12s are my way of separating the Core'dinations papers from the rest.  I like textured cardstock or plain whites for card bases.  Once I cut a 12x12, if the leftover piece is large enough to make another card base I slip it back onto the tray.  Otherwise, the smaller scraps are cut into pieces no larger than 6x6 and stored in a quart size ziplock bag.  I sorted the scraps by color.  See that brown basket, bottom shelf on top of the drawer set?  It contains all the bags of scraps.

 

 

About those designer papers... I was surprised, actually, to be able to contain it in this small an area.  I didn't give up any of it.  Each 6x6 pad is placed inside a quart size storage bag.  I cut off the zipper top of the bag because it just gets in the way.  Scraps are kept in the bag with the pad they came from.

 

Now, here's the fun part.  My 12x12 designer paper had been stored on those shelves with the cardstock.  Most of it is rather old because I've been trying to use up a drawer full of sizeable scraps before I cut more.  The drawer was stuffed full and never seemed to get less full.  Well... I cut all the 12x12 designer paper into 6x6 sheets -- gasp!  But, truth is, I always reach for the 6x6 pads, so why not turn all those 12x12s into 6x6 collections?  Whenever I buy one sheet of 12x12 I always buy one or two coordinating sheets, as well.  These cut into very nice small 6x6 collections, each in its own storage bag.  I had quite a few rather full SU! collections and I cut those, too.  Plus, I cut up all the DP that was stuffed into the drawer, therefore turning it into tidy, pretty, very accessible collections which I'm much more likely to use.  And the drawer is now empty.

 

Stamps and more:

 

 

Pictured above is stamp storage in the closet.  The Sterilite drawers help sort the stamps and fit nicely in the cube units.  Little turntables (lazy Susans) hold certain essential tools and products.  The other drawers are full of mostly envelopes, but the smaller drawers hold some hardware and miscellany.  More stamps below:

 

 

SU! sets (mostly backgrounds and sentiments) are stored like books on a shelf with the ends labeled.  You can see most of them are older sets.  Power Poppy has its own bucket, and will have a larger space allotted as the collection grows.  I have some space available for it.  Those photo boxes hold miscellaneous stamps (single and sets) of jumbled up sizes.  Sure, it would be nice if all stamps were exactly the same size so they'd be easier to store, but that's not how it works in real life.  I like the boxes for keeping the jumble out of sight, plus they're colorful and they stack neatly.

 

You wouldn't believe how many stamps I cleared out, not to mention all the other supplies I just had to have at one time or another.  It's all gone to a local charity which now has a section created specifically for craft supplies.  I know it's all just because of the stuff I've given them since I started this project last spring.

 

The clearing and sorting is done now.  Everything's in its place and the room is usable once again and so much better.  Friendlier, prettier, roomier.  I still have the Stamping Command Center, but it's been moved to the other side of the room.  This is where I'll do all the card construction and inky stuff.

 

 

There's a smaller desk across the room where I'll sit to color in front of the new, larger window.  The window will come down to desk top level, letting in more light, and giving me a view of the garden and beyond.  I'll be getting a new desk for that window, plus two new chairs.  I have to wait for the window before I can paint the room, so I'll save more pictures for later.

 

That's it, folks!  It's the best I can do after letting it go for so long in such a small space.  I've taken a good look at all my stamps and papers and embellishments, cleared out the unessential and, honestly, it all feels brand new.  I started constructing a card at the Stamping Command Center yesterday afternoon and it was so fun with everything sorted and easy to find.  I'll keep it this way in the future.  I will, I will, I will...

 

Thanks for coming along!  Have a good day!