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Help please! I'm blessed to have many SU sets and other misc. stamps, however, they are "out of control". I have a binder with a copy of the stamp sets (copies of the new stamp sheet labels or a stamped image). My problem is categorizing them. I have a head injury from a long ago car accident and am confused easily.
I am trying to organize my rubber stamp bookshelf so that I can locate my sets without too much searching and such. I'm letting a lot of my sets go unused because I can't locate them. I would appreciate any suggestions for categories and/or organization tips. Also, where should I put the stamp sets that have flowers, sayings and a cake in one set? I have the little sets that have 12 small stamps with flip flops, dog, purse, umbrella, etc. and don't know where they should go because they have a little bit of everything. I have the "Girlfriends" set, the "Monkey Business" and "Cool Cat" sets (or similar sets) and don't know where to put those types.
I realize this is a very long post but I wanted to give the specifics of my situation. I don't know if this is in the right category for a post either as I can't remember where I should put the posts. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
I have a section for "All Occasion", one for floral, animals, birthday, wedding/anniversary, summer, Valentine, Easter, Fall, Christmas, Winter, Alphabets, sentiments, etc. I have over 450 sets and can find what I'm looking for in an instant. People who come to stamp with me are amazed at how quickly I can find what I'm looking for. That's what works for me.
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Sandy
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I also have a category for outdoors and nature -- the leafy sets; I started out with Holidays, have divided that into Christmas and other -- oh, and I have a category "girlfriends" -- these are the sets I'd send mostly to girlfriends -- like Bubble Queen. HTH!
Location: Saskatchewan, Land Of Living Skies Canada
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I'm guessing the rest do this - when I stamp my sets in my book. I have one sheet with the full set on, that gets put in alphabetal order of the sets name such as All I have Seen will go in the A's also each set has how many stamps and a letter and number behind it in sequence. So- All I have Seen (4) A1, next one will be All in a Row (4) A2 and so on. I know when I am finished with the sets that I already have they will all be in alphabetical order, now the new ones will just have to go in sequence order but still under the letter it starts with. Example: if I bought Artfully Asian - it would just go into the A's with whatever the last A? would be.
Then I take my stamp set and stamp each stamp in a category that it suits best such as Nature, words, sentiments, flowers, birthday, shapes, animals, wedding, baby, backgrounds. On top of that stamp I will write the letter and number which corresponds to that stamp set. So All in a Row is A2 I would stamp it into borders and backgrounds with A2 on top so I know which set these are from. If it had a stamp suited for birthdays in it I would stamp that stamp in birthdays and also put A2 above that stamp so again I know which set I should be looking for. Since all the stamps are in alphabetical order its no problem. When I have a birthday card to make I just go to my birthday section and all stamps having anything to do with a birthday are right there. Yes, its a lot of work to do all the sets now that I have over 100 but now I can at least find what I want or see what I have easily. Clear as mud, I hope not because this has helped me a lot. Please pm me if you have any ?'s
Kathy
Maybe it would be helpful to categorize according to the catalog, such as Holiday, Occasions, Nature ect. then have subcategories. For holidays your could have subs such as christmas, valentines day, birthday. If you look at your catalog as much as I do you kinda get a feel for what sets go in each section. I feel Stampin' Up has done a pretty good job of putting sets in each category. It maybe more organizing than you want to do but maybe worth a shot.
Maybe it would be helpful to categorize according to the catalog, such as Holiday, Occasions, Nature ect. then have subcategories. For holidays your could have subs such as christmas, valentines day, birthday. If you look at your catalog as much as I do you kinda get a feel for what sets go in each section. I feel Stampin' Up has done a pretty good job of putting sets in each category. It maybe more organizing than you want to do but maybe worth a shot.
Happy Organizing,
Tina
This is how I organize also
You can see pictures of my stamp room and the shelves here if that helps!
__________________ Liz
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Looks like everyone that has replied has them organized much like I do. I have a box where I put holidays and then I subcategorize them by which holiday (Christmas, Thanksgiving, Valentines, etc)
Here are my other categories:
Backgrounds, Borders, and Frames
Words and Sentiments
All occasion (this is where I put the stamp sets that have a little of everything)
Flowers
Animals/Nature
People
Asian (I have a lot of Asian so this is a separate category for me)
International (this is where I have Egyptian, Celtic, etc)
Things (this is a hodgepodge of things like transportation, music, etc)
Landscape
Okay Kathy...I know I already told you this but this is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING! I can already see how this will make a huge difference in my stamping. As you said, it is a lot of work, but well worth all the effort. Thank you also for the category listing. I'm already working on putting my stamp sets in alpha order so I can begin labeling them. Thanks again! Bee
Location: Saskatchewan, Land Of Living Skies Canada
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Oh, Bee when you are organizing in Alphabetical order when you finish with the A stamp sets don't forget to change to B's. I was going along so well until I realized I was onto a different letter and I was still lettering with the A's - oh someday I will wake up......When you get to the stamp sets starting with B - use B. lalalalala in my own little world...hehehe
Tina ~ Your room is awesome! What a nice room to "get away for the day to play!" I'm hoping some day I'll have a dedicated craft room vs. a little bit here and a little bit there. I'm just thankful to have so much fun "stuff". Thanks for sharing.
Location: prolly in my 'rubber room'... in the mid-west
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i have tried to organize according to type and or holiday... i just don't have as much room as you all or something, plus with all the diff size boxes. i haven't found the right way yet... guess i should keep reading! have found soooooo many good ideas so far. thanx girls
I've found that it is easiest for me to store my stamp sets alphabetically. I store them on their side and put the names on the side (like the title on the binding of a book) on a book shelf. I have a binder that has and index of each stamp set.
When I first started I organized them in categories but I found that there were too many sets that could be in different categories.
I also used to stack my stamp sets on top of each other, that was hard because to get to the bottom one I made a mess.
I hope you find a way to organize that works for you, you may have to play around with it to find what works for you.
Hi all! I have recently been trying to get all my stamping things organized as all. I have looked through the forums to find some help. I have taken some general ideas, and then created spreadsheets that fit for me. It sure is a lot of work, at first, especially since I should have started this when I first started stamping. However, at that time, I had no idea how much stuff I would collect in just a little over a year! I decided I had to do something when it took me too long to find exactly what I was looking for when I wanted to make something. I am pretty OCD anyway when it comes to organization. I can make a mess while I am working, but then, everything has to go back where it belongs so I can find it the next time. Thank you everyone for some basic ideas.
I followed about the same plan as Kathy, except since I don't have that many SU stamps, I labeled them with company initials & number (e.g. PTI3, MFT4, SU . I also did the separate category stamping as Kathy suggested. I've only been stamping for a year, and it took me a solid week to finish, so be prepared to have it take some time, but it is so worth it!
Also, I did separate sentiment category pages for:
Birthday
Hello/Miss You/Friendship
Thank You
Congrats/Wedding/Baby
Feel Better/Sympathy
Quotes
Love
and then one for each separate holiday.
It makes it a lot easier to read the sentiments if you go straight down the page in columns. I was trying to "save paper" by smooshing them all together, but it made it really hard to read. Here's a pic from my gallery.
I followed about the same plan as Kathy, except since I don't have that many SU stamps, I labeled them with company initials & number (e.g. PTI3, MFT4, SU . I also did the separate category stamping as Kathy suggested. I've only been stamping for a year, and it took me a solid week to finish, so be prepared to have it take some time, but it is so worth it!
Also, I did separate sentiment category pages for:
Birthday
Hello/Miss You/Friendship
Thank You
Congrats/Wedding/Baby
Feel Better/Sympathy
Quotes
Love
and then one for each separate holiday.
It makes it a lot easier to read the sentiments if you go straight down the page in columns. I was trying to "save paper" by smooshing them all together, but it made it really hard to read. Here's a pic from my gallery.
Stamp categories/tips for organization
