Rubber stamp conundrum

[jfugina]

I'm sure this topic has come up before (maybe several times), but I'm going to pose it again. For those of you with years and years of Club Scrap UMs, how do you have them organized? I currently have all of mine (probably about three years worth) in CD cases by kit, but I was recently looking for a "Thinking of you" sentiment. Didn't care what kit it was from - just wanted the words. And I went through every single Club Stamp case, and couldn't find a single one. I know I've done the same for other sentiments, and have been met with equal frustration. And as I look through the cases, I'm often met with a renewed sense of "WTF would anyone ever use this for?" I guess if I were more in the habit of using stamps to make scrapbook embellishments, some of those might make more sense. But I've found that I generally keep the stamp usage to cards, and ATCs and tags back in the day when I was into that.

I've recently been of a mind to just dump them all out of their CD cases, and sort them into categories that might help me get more use out of them. For starters, I'd just put all of the things that make logical sense on a greeting card into one pile. Then maybe florals and botanicals in another pile, geometrics, etc.... I'm not sure, but I do wonder if anyone has ever done that, and if that worked out for you. One thing I do know is that once I combine, I'll never be able to get them sorted back into their original kits. And I'm wondering if I'd regret that.

Maybe I start by just pulling out everything that would be good for greeting cards, and just get that in one place. I've got all of my WMs and my UMs that aren't from Club Scrap all sorted into small drawers by category, and I definitely seem to use those more when making cards. I'm just wondering if I should go full out and just dismantle all of my kits and co-mingle them by category with everything else.

So, does anyone have UMs stored in any way besides by kit? If so, is that working out?

[pamcook]

I gave them all to Debi!

[pat-czap]

Makes sense to me Julie. I should do the same sorting. All of mine are still by kit, and look, where that got us! I say toss the weird, keep the useful. You know there are designers at CS with a different point of view, just sayin'.

My wood mounted are by category.

[jfugina]

I gave them all to Debi!

I'm pretty sure that a large selection of my WMs actually came from you, Pam! LOL. And I probably haven't used most of them any more than you did, but for some reason, stamps are just not something I'm anxious to be rid of. I think because they just hold so much potential - I just need more time to experiment, and I need to figure out where I stored all of those old TJ newsletters.

[Monica]

I ended up unmounting all my WM and storing everything on stamp storage pages in binders. Most of it is broken down by category but I do need to finish sorting out the last two binders into categories! I found it a lot easier when looking for a sentiment to have them grouped together. The other thing I keep meaning to do with them is stamp an index so I know what I have for each category, and know what all the phrases, quotes and sentiments are without having to go find a mirror.

[mpizzazz]

I did it years ago for all my stamps-unmounted the wooden ones from every company, only kept the CS UMs that I would actually use. I put everything together on plastic page protectors by theme-flowers, geometrics, swirls, dots, etc. All the greeting stamps are together by phrase like "Thank You", "Happy Birthday", etc. I did stamp all the images on the cover sheet that goes in the page protector. It makes it so much easier and faster to choose a phrase or image that fits the style of your card.

I just use cheap 8.5 x 11 page protectors with a piece of cardstock inside and they aren't in binders. I just stood them up on their edges in a cardboard box so I could flip through. Takes up much less space than binders with rigid pages and costs almost nothing. Since then, I put most of the stamps in with other papers/embellishments of the same theme like Beach, Flowers, Christmas, etc.

I put Tack It Again and Again on the UMs so they would stick to the page protector and not all be down the bottom of it.

[EDelValle]

There are two documents in the CS library
that were put together by a club member
many moons ago. It most likely is not up
to date but if you have older kit stamps and are looking
for a particular phrase her list might help you find
it quicker. here's the link for the library:
https://clubscrap.com/reference-library-documents/

[Debbie AZ]

I got rid of all but a handful of CS stamps. Still have gobs of paper......

[jfugina]

I say toss the weird, keep the useful. You know there are designers at CS with a different point of view, just sayin'.
...

Oh, I know. I mean, the designer surely had some idea in mind for each image as they decided to include them in the collection. But some of these?? I started down the path of pulling out just the sentiments this evening after work, and even that isn't as simple as I was thinking. I have a massive pile of sayings that maybe could possibly be used as encouragement, maybe? Some are just ... I don't know. I have a very large pile that will need a second pass.

I did actually pitch one just now. From "gimme a ring", and it was tiny print of instructions for how to dial a rotary phone. Um. No. I do think that as I go through several more rounds of sorting, that there will be a few more that land in the trash because of how useless they seem. But for the moment, this project is going on pause because my ability to imagine the art of the possible is failing.

Several of you mentioned stamping index pages - it's clear that it's going to be absolutely necessary to do that, as I can't make out some of the funky and/or tiny print when it's backwards. I found a pack of 8.5x11 acrylic sheets in my stash. No idea why I have them, but that's what I'm sticking stuff to at the moment. I need to re-tack a bunch of these to make them stick. But once everything is sorted onto logically grouped acrylic sheets, and I've stamped an index print, I'll put them in page protectors, or maybe large ziplock bags.

Thanks for all of the advice. Based on how far I got in an hour, I now know that this is much more significant undertaking than originally envisioned. But it will be worth it if I can have all of my "thinking of you" stamps all in one place the next time I'm looking.

[Monica]

Julie, I did my initial work with the binders over a month of evenings while watching/listening to the TV. Something to distract part of my brain while I dealt with it!

[Keitha]

While not CS I have many UM stamps, all sorted by category with alphas, words and phrases together. If I had kits and wasn't sure if I'd be happy once they were broken up, I'd start by just pulling the sentiment stamps from the kits to store together - but I'd include a stamped image of the stamp with the kit in case I wanted to revert to how they came. I'm assuming many of the stamps match or coordinate with the papers so it does make some sense to leave the image stamps with the kit, but if I were reorganizing the whole lot by theme, I'd again put a stamped image of the set with the papers so I knew that I had something that matched.

[pbp908]

I was a rebel way back when and took all kits apart - stamps, papers, fibers, etc. Now the papers are sorted by color, the stamps by broad categories, and the fibers/ribbons are in a box and separated by colors. I ended up donating what I knew I'd never use and haven't regretted it one bit. I did get a bit irked by the lack of sentiments in the CS kits that I liked, so I purchased several different sayings collections. I think my favorites are the Penny Black stamps because theirs cover a broad range of topics. And it helps add to the stash when Bonnie comes by and says "I must have really liked this because I bought 2 of them." That's how I ended up with even more sentiments.

[jfugina]

Once I realized that I was not loving the ALSB layouts anymore (the kits just got weird for a while), I also started separating all of the kit components. I use mostly the solid color side for background/base paper. And every month I would cut apart the stamps, and put the adhesive on them, wonder what I'd ever use them for, and then put them on a shelf. Most sheets only have one or two images that have ever been inked.

And then, like you Pam, I went out and ordered some very basic sentiment sheets to cover my most common needs.

Monica - I think your time assessment is spot on. I think this is going to be something to work a bit at a time over several weeks.

[BekiWard@msn.com]

I took several boxes of them to re(create) and let everyone take whatever they wanted and said I wasn't taking any back home.

I still have more than I need/want or will ever use...including a hoarde of CS wood mounted stamps, some of which have the numbers written on them, anyone remember those? Like, 450/1847...or whatever.

For too long, I kept everything divided by kits. Since then, I've separated all the papers by ROYGBV solids and patterned papers.

[pamcook]

One of the most freeing things I ever heard about stamp sets is that you can just keep the stamps you love and will use. You don’t have to keep the whole set.
Plus - I realized I don’t need more than 2 or 3 Happy Birthday stamps. My taste in stamp designs changes. My need for certain stamps changes. It just felt good to give myself permission to get rid of those I didn’t like or need anymore.
Then again, I rarely use stamps anyway. I have a few wood mounted stamps and use them fairly often (for me). My clear stamps are in bins so I can flip through quickly. That’s all my wood mounted stamps and only half my clear stamps. I could get rid of 2/3 my clear stamps and never miss them.

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