I'm sorry I started this!

[paddlegal]

Someone should have been here to whack me. This has been on my mind for months . I am reorganizing and consolidating my stamps. What a mess. Even though my stamps are semi organized by themes they are also by company. So first off I'm gathering my favorite themes together: birds, coffee and floral. Maybe this was a bad idea now that I see how many sets I have of just those categories alone. And here I was drooling over another must have coffee set. (This probably won't stop me, it's too wonderful)

I'm hoping by posting this it will keep me on task and I won't stop until I can make sense of it all and put it back up on my shelves to really enjoy. (Hint: March's card sketch challenge prompted me to do this)

[jmp1022]

I keep putting my off

[pamcook]

Don't give up. Those big projects are worth the effort if you see them to the end. My last big purge/reorganization was a lot of work but still working for me.
Good luck!

[nchoney]

I have a zillion more stamps than that. Almost all of them are unmounted and glued and on page protectors in big binders. I got most of the CS ones sorted and in binders by year. Then I'll need to figure out a strategy for storing the rest. Your theme idea sounds like a good plan.

Don't worry about having too many...as long as you're using them.

[paddlegal]

Debi don't think for a minute that these are my only stamps. Those three boxes are just the 3 categories I mentioned. Also, I'm working strictly on my clear stamps. Wood mounted are pretty settled as are the unmounted CS stamps. My next reorganization will be my Unity sets. Thank goodness I ended that membership when I did. I have too many of them and I'm thinking of breaking them up since there's such an unrelated variety in each set. So many good ones but hard to find due to that.

[ScrappinJen]

Those Unity stamps do drive one crazy, don't they, Farley? I have one sheet on my desk right in front of me now and there's a woman and a feather and a sun and a flower and a leaf and a camera and it goes on and on and on. How does one store these darn things? I guess the thing would be to actually use them and then file them where I think I would find them. But I don't like to break up my sets. I'll never remember where they came from.

[paddlegal]

I am now done with my bird and coffee categories and have done a lot of consolidating which has actually freed up some room. My next category is florals/nature.

As for Unity, I'm thinking of first taking out the sentiments that I like or will use. There's a bunch that I know I'll never, ever put on a card or LO. Then go after holidays and other well defined themes. But storing them is another head scratcher. Right now the sets are still in the zip bags they came in. I don't want to think about them just yet.

[nchoney]

Oh, I know you have more stamps! LOL

I'm still wondering why I felt compelled to buy all the unmounted CS sheets. And I wish there was a better way to organize them other than by year. I've pulled out all the Christmas ones. But all the others are such a variety. Not sure how you'll wind up handling your Unity sets if they're so varied. Maybe Mark an image sheet as to where each is stored, and then break the sets up into your own themes?

Maybe this is a good idea for a whole new breed of professional organizer. One who specializes in scrapbook supply organization!

[pamcook]

I don't have so many that I can't flip through them to find what I'm looking for but someday I do plan to sort them into categories.

Debi - I wouldn't worry about what year the CS stamps were from (just my two cents). I would sort them by categories (all my stamp sets). Like anything, I end up with a huge "Miscellaneous" category but once I learned to sort by how I categorize supplies in my brain, I find what I need more quickly. Does that help at all?

[paddlegal]

Debi I broke up all components of my CS kits several years ago. Paper, doodads and stamps! I was so much happier with the stamps separated by theme and especially the sentiments. The CS UMs are housed in binders up on a shelf above my desk and very easy to grab. . Some sets special to me I kept intact. I pretty much have all my clear stamps organized now and am busting to go play with them. I'll face my Unity sets hopefully later today. It's rainy here so a good project to attack.

[pamcook]

Yay for more rain in CA!

[Monica]

Farley, you're reminding me that I need to finish sorting my binders of UMs and label them, so I can find what I need without pulling out half a dozen of them each time! I still have a gallon size baggie with stamps to finish unmounting as well. Maybe I'll get those out once I've unearthed my spare table again.

[troublesmom]

I have been working on redoing my stamps for some time.
Here is how I was doing them a couple of years ago. These are mainly Club Scrap stamps that I put in Stampin' Up! holders. I have a lot of these stamps that I will never use so I'm not doing anything with them at all. I hope to get rid of a lot of them.

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I am in the process of reworking and using the Avery Elle envelopes. I like this much better as they don't take up near the room. I also divided a lot of them according to theme - Birthday, thinking of you, Thank you, etc.

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P2180216.JPG (57.06 KiB) Viewed 713 times

[nchoney]

Once I get the rest of the room semi-organized, I'll tackle stamps again. Still have a bunch to unmount and put glue on, so it may be a while.

I'll keep watching your efforts!!

[paddlegal]

Cheryl I love those Avery Elle sleeves. Ellen Hutson also makes great ones too (slightly heavier) and I use them both. Because of how I rearranged my stamps yesterday, I ended up with about 20 empty sleeves that I could reuse. I removed about a third of my CTMH stamp sets that would properly fit into one. Now I have a pile of those square plastic envelopes that snap for different uses. All of my SU stamps are now in sleeves just like how you showed above. The SU cases and the CTMH plastic snap envelopes just take up too much room.

After my rearranging last night I had to label all the newly done containers with bright pink sticky notes showing what is in them. I know I'm going to be lost for a few days until I get used to the new homes/shelves they've been switched around to.