We LOVE Unity!!! Even more 9 years later!!

We LOVE Unity!!!  Even more 9 years later!!

Friday, March 18, 2011

Have you cataloged your stamps?

This project will likely take me a year!  I really am leaning towards it.
Let me show you what I am dealing with here.  I am not bragging, I have been buying stamp sets for about 14 years now.  I use them nearly every day.  The problem is, take this old Inkadinkado set that happens to be on my desk right now.
I keep it in my Cookbook stuff.  So I have never used it on a Birthday card.  I have never used it on a Party Invite.  The when, Where, Who and Notes stamps would be so darling on a tag for some journaling on a scrapbook page right?  I have used the soup pot, the place setting, the ice cream and the cupcake all on recipe pages.  Now if I stamped the BIRTHDAY on a B-Day sheet and the soiree, and it's a freakin; party on a party sheet and the glass of wine and the cocktail on a Drink sheet etc wouldn't I use so many more stamps?
Let me show you the mess I am dealing with:
I did this a few years go.  It is all my dollar stamps separated and themed.  I LOVE it!  I use them way more now!  But it is a very small project compared to the big sets LOL  Plus I want to keep the big sets together I think.
See what a mess these stamps are?  Just thrown in containers.  Journaling, alphabets and borders is as good as the organization gets!
This shelf is a COMPLETE mess.  I have no clue what is in there.  NONE!  I have to dig around and see if anything strikes my fancy!
Look at how organized my SU sets are, they are THROWN in a bucket LOL
See the rest of them?  Stacked behind my paper scraps?  I use those a TON [total sarcasm].  Why yes that is Minnie Mouse's head stuck to the floor.  Carlee sticks stickers EVERYWHERE!  No surface is off limits in her opinion!
The House Mouse and Changito are in the wall because they are cute.  Do I use them?  Not so much.  If I had a bunny drinking a bottle on the baby page maybe I would don't you think?  Or a Monkey swinging on a swing on a outdoor page??
I ran out of stuftainers so my poor Unity stamps are in a shoe box on the floor?  GASP!
These are all my {ippity} and Unity sets.  They are my favorite so they are right in front of me!  I do use them a lot.  One of the things I love about Unity is their Kit's of the month are all over the place.  Such a fantastic variety of stamps on an 8.5 x 11 piece of rubber awesomeness.  BUT if I had them cataloged I would know right where to go when I was scrapping a page don't you think?
These are my recipe album stamps.  Aren't they so organized? You are with my on the sarcasm right?
These need to be unmounted and put away! 
Oh!  Look another shoebox of stamps.  These are baby!
A random tiny container of word stamps that I never use because I don't know what words are in there!  And it looks like a set of Brackets.  Those should be in the with the journaling stamps???
Here we have some randomness to beat all.  QK stamps and dies plus stamps that came in CD cases.  Sored by containers I guess???
No organization at all just a box full of random sets.
The ones not in the container are Halloween, the ones in the container?  No organization at all.  See my problem?  I am not using these because they are a mess.  I start something and just walk away it's too much.
This was my last organization of the stamps project!  I flip through them, they fall on the ground.  They rip the cellophanee covers....... 
I LOVE Owls, Birds and Butterflies!  These stamps are committed to memory but still a mess  LOL 
This is how I started 14 years ago.  Above and below are wood mounted and thrown in a drawer.  They are still there.  These must be unmounted and used!

More stamps just shoved behind my Embossing Powder! 
A clear drawer of Love themed stamps.  Those stars have a heart on the set.  Am I going to look in the love drawer for a star?  No!
This drawer here, they are small.  That is the whole organization!  These sets are small?  Who does that? 
Christmas!  Why I decided that gift should be Christmas instead of birthday I am not sure.....
Random monkey stamps with my ribbon? 
House Mouse that won't fit on the wall wasting space tiny spice rack. 
These darling Gruffies have never seen ink!  They are shoved behind my Expression!

Of you made it this far, Thank You!
Am I CRAZY for even attempting to start this?  I did start it last night.  I did 7 random sets.  They are stamped on 15 different themed sheets.  I think this just might work.  I understand that it will take me over a year to really get this in order.  Do you think it is possible?  I really think I am going to try!

7 comments:

Patricia said...

Wow! You have a lot of stamps! I only started stamping about 8 months ago so my collection is rather small compared to yours. But, I have the same problem! I spend a ton of time looking for the right stamp and end up missing the perfect one because I have no organization. All my stamps are in a bag *gasp*! I would love to see how you are cateloging them and what themes youare using to organize. I think it is a great idea and, if I start now while my collection is small, it may not be so overwhelming! Good luck!

NoraAnne said...

WOW! I am overwhelmed just reading about it and I am also peeing my pants laughing at all your sarcasm, especially the part about the small sets! "Who does that?"
The answer is ME! LOL! I have stamps EVERYWHERE, organized in 20 different types of containters, in 20 different kinds of ways! You might just beat me in volume though, you have a SERIOUS collection going!
I'm curious too to see how you are cataloguing, damn, I wish I could just come over! I love the space saving idea of unmounting wood stamps but I just CAN'T get myself to do it. I know everyone that does just LOVES it, but I can't get myself talked into it. I'm scared! :)I fear I will end up with a sticky horrible mess. And I'm such a hoarder that i also fear I will have to save all the wood "just in case" then that defeats the purpose!
I am a serious head case!

Emily (stampingout on SCS) said...

Would love to catalog my stamps. I am sure, like you, I would probably rediscover so many stamps I haven't used in a lot of years! LOL! I like to refer to my craft room as an organized mess. I know where things are, but if you walked in, you would probably say, "what the ****?" LOL.
Cataloging stamps seems like such a daunting task, but you go girl. :)

Jan Garber said...

I own about 1/50 of the stamps you do, and still haven't kept up with organizing them! I actually DO have a box of what is labeled "Bitty Stamps", all too small to use for anything big. Just small dollar and specialty stamps... I started several years ago stamping the mages onto cardstock and filing in a binder. That has gone awry long ago!

Noahsarkgirl said...

I came over from Momo, and boy do you have a lot of stamps! I don't have very many so I'm not having trouble storing them, but I might some of your ideas to get them in order now instead of waiting until later!

Sandy O said...

Oh, it sure is possible and you will be sooooo glad you did it! Just keep at it, lol, no walking away, ha ha ha

Carisa said...

wow, all i can say is wow! you really do have a ton of stamps!!! i'm terrible as i like to purge so if i haven't used something in a long while it's got to GO! LOL i am not sure i understand the cataloging idea but i'm sure you can do it. you have a lot more organization going on than i do for sure already! good luck and have fun!