Saturday, January 2, 2010

New Stamp Room

You CAN fit a marshmallow into a piggy bank!!!
Yes, yes, it can be done - my new stamp room is evidence of that!  I CANNOT believe how much stuff I have managed to get into this little 9x9 room.  (Well, the room is actually 9x12 but I graciously gave up 3 whole feet of space to my husband for his gaming stuff - sorry honey, I promise a bigger space in the future)!!
IMG_7660
As I said in an earlier post, I have purged a ton of stuff that will be going in a paper craft garage sale this summer so if you live in the Kindersley area and want some new treats to add to your stash, watch this blog and the Kindersley Clarion for deets!
Okay, so this will be a long one as I want to share quite a few things.  I think I have 4 favorite things about my new space - 1.  I get to be in the same room with my sweet heart when we are hobbying.
2.  it is not a SPACE, it is an actual room - which keeps my things nice a neat!                         
 3.  I can have all my toys out ready to be played with and not have to dig for them ie my cuttlebug, my janome sew mini, my bind it all and my cricut!
4.  I get to display some of the really special things that my Prettie Girls have sent me!!
So before we start, I have to tell you that there was no way I could get a nice shot of the whole room, so the pic will be starting looking at my desk and moving counter clockwise around the room:
My desk is an old bankers desk that I striped and painted white:
IMG_7642 This is the right of the top of my desk.  I have my score pal, my CM wave cutter and my fiskar's cutter right beside me at all times.  In the little white drawers you see above those there are my SU markers, small tools such as precision tweezers, paper piercer, cutting blade, pastel eraser, etc., as well as other writing tools, white pen, silver pen, versamark pen.  In the middle unit are misc adhesives, such as scotch tape, vellum tape, dotto and then some other mediums to stamp on such as paint swatches and arborite swatches as well as staples and my mini stapler.  In the unit to the left, I have my copic refills, liquid pearls, all my swarovskis and other bling, twinkling, H2Os, and my shimmerz and blingz.
IMG_7639
IMG_7638 In my desk are two huge drawers underneath the work surface.  In them I store the things I use ALOT that I like to have close by at all times.  Scissors, adhesive, glue dots, pop dots, basic grey files, crop a dlie, my 1/16" hole punch, refills for my stamp n scrub.
In the left hand drawer is my acrylic blocks, already stamped and colored images waiting to be made into cards and my craft and rubber scissors.
Back to the top of my desk :0):
IMG_7675 This is my Making Memories carosel.  Can I just say that if you don't have one of these - you NEED one!  As you can see, I use it to store my copic markers.
IMG_7676 I have tried a hundred different ways to store my markers.  I have used the little drawer units from above - until I got more markers than I had drawers, I have stored them in clear boxes standing up but they never really stood up straight, I tried laying them down in the ginormous drawers I just showed you but I wasn't really happy with any of those things.  Then it dawned on me that this carousel would be perfect for them!  I used to store the things that I have in my drawer in here ie punches, scissors, etc but now I have this pretty holder for them and I LOVE IT!  The little drawers underneath hold small various items such as post it notes, paper clips, batteries, etc.
IMG_7640 This the top of the desk moving counter clockwise as I mentioned above.  Below my carousel, is my stamp n scrub and my cutting mat (this is my main work space).  As you can see above, I have my two color caddies with all my SU ink pads and some of the palette/paper trey ink pads.  My lap top goes where ever I am and today we happed to be in my stamp room!
IMG_7645 SPECIAL picture here!!!  LOOK at all the special pretties:  Right behind my laptop, in front of the color caddy you will see a gorgieous tape holder that my sweet Jessie made me, beside that to the left is a pen & paper caddy Danielle sent me.  Right next to the colorcaddy on the white shelf is an amazing Sophia calender that Danielle also sent me.  You'll also see hanging on the wall above the bottles my flutterby butterfly from my right hand girl - Jules!  I love looking at these pretties every day!  They make me think of the girls that sent them and how very blessed I am to have them in my life! 
The shelf that the calender is sitting on is actually a CD holder from ikea turned on its side.  In it are my metalic ink pads and my glue pads as well as my stamp cleaners and spectrum pads.  There are other miscellaneous items on the shelf that make my heart happy as well as my OTT lite which I totally love!
IMG_7646 To my immediate left hand side while I'm sitting at my desk is this stack of 12x12 sterilite drawers - you'll be seeing alot of those in these pics.  I love these drawers.  You can see that they are all labelled.  I have my brads and other embellies in the drawers as well as dp scraps and ribbon scraps, cuttlebug folders, etc.  You'll see my well loved "bug" on the top of the drawers.
IMG_7644 More sterilite drawers under my desk - they have my cardstock scraps in them.  Arranged by color.  I try to use up scraps before I cut into any new cardstock (I'm not entirely happy with this set up but I don't have alot of file space which I think would be a better system).
IMG_7648 This a rolling file cart that houses all my cardstock, vellum, window sheets, etc. according to alphabetized color.  Excuse the cords laying on top there - they are just from my heat gun which you will see on top of the cart on the right.  The clear shoe box is full of my nesties and cuttlebug things and next to that my Sew Mini.
IMG_7647 This is the shoe box I was telling you about.  I have all of my nesties stored on magnetic sheets.  As I collect them, I expect them to stand up straighter in here but for now they lay on an angle.  I can flip through them really easily to find exactly what I'm looking for - kind of like a recipe box.
IMG_7650 I told you you'd be seeing more of those drawers.  On top of this stack are some paper holders with uncut dp and my bind it all!  I think my big tools will be "loved" much more than they have been since they are so much more accessible. Now if you are a Stamping UP nazi, you'll want to sit down!  I decided that I had literally hundreds of sets that I was only using part of the stamps out of so I decided that enough was enough and I broke up my sets.  I KNOW - I never ever thought I would do that but I did!  Now that I have so many other stamp company's stamps I just can't justify keeping the whole set when there is only 1 stamp that I just can't part with!  SO, these drawers are all classified and labelled into categories such as get well, sympathy, birthday, animals, flowers, etc.  They are full of my wood mounted and clear stamp sets and I am already finding that I am using them more often because I now know what I have and where to find it. 
Also, in these drawers are my dew drops, metal embellies and hard ware, cardstock die cut shapes, rub ons, and stickers and eyelets.
IMG_7649 On top of the stack of sterilite is another little drawer unit (I have no clue what is in there right now - ya, I'm really organized hey!) and on top of that is my card holder that I keep some of my favorite cards in.
IMG_7652 Onto the back wall.  This is the space directly behind my back when I'm at my desk.  Just a little white shelf that houses my Paper Pretties binders, my bella binders, my ribbon thinga ma bob (can't remember the name), my CTMH stamps, some small punches, any stamp sets that are in metal containers (those need to go into the sterilite drawers), and my prismacolor pencils.  On top is my cricut, the cartridges and my tool kit.
Hanging above the shelf are some rails from Ikea that hold my whale tail punches and some hanging metal baskets that hold decorative scissors, more small punches, punches with scissor type handles, border punches, wheel guide and ruler.
IMG_7651 Above that is a white shelf we picked up at a garage sale for $10.  It was unfinished pine so Andy painted it white for me.  On there are two dowels of ribbon (organized by color).  Hanging off of the bottom dowel is a ribbon organizer (can't remember the name of it either - have I mentioned it is 12:43 am right now?  Above the ribbon are some prima flowers and my buttons (also sorted by color).  Above those are more prima flowers (by color) and then ribbon scraps in the little jars with the black lids.  On the very top of the shelf you'll see some more of my pretties - a very sweet box Christi sent me, a sour cream container I made at one of our very first Stamping In Your Jammies a LLLLLLLOOOOOONNNNGGGGG time ago.  A needlepoint rose that my grandma made, a John Deer tractor my Grandpa bought me when I was a very little girl, and my Prettie Purse from Jana!
IMG_7653 Continueing to move around the room, I have these two white cupboards which hold a ton of stuff.  On top are all of my already made cards, organized by occassion and ready to send when need arises. Geez, I only have 7 boxes of them - anyone need any cards?
IMG_7654 Inside the 1st shelf (the one with the door open above) on the top shelf are my SU, CTMH catties and my paper crafting, scrapbooking mags (um ya, the other box of them isn't unpacked yet - YIKES).  On the 2nd shelf are all our scrapbooks that are always a work in progress.  The shelf below that holds a cropper hopper drawer that holds all my chip board.
IMG_7655 The bottom two shelves hold these cardboard drawers from Ikea (they hold the boys Cuttekid and their stamps and ink pads.  Next to that is some dp that is designated for scrapbooking only.  On the bottom shelf are unopened packages of cardstock and 12x12 cardstock and huge binder full of stickers.  One of my big goals in organizing this room was to do more scrapbooking so I tried to dedicate this cupboard to that!
IMG_7656 You still with me?  We're almost done!  This what the entirety of the second cupboard looks like inside - ALL SU sets organized and labelled by category much like the ones in the sterilite drawers.
IMG_7659 I got Andy to take the bifold doors off of the closet since they were getting in my way - LOL!  Inside the closet is this rainbow drawer unit that houses all of my House Mouse, Happy Hoppers and Rubber Romance stamps.  On top of it is my clip it up that now holds yet more ribbon!
IMG_7658 This is the shelf above the clip it up - I have these baskets hanging from the closet shelf that hold the remainder of my ribbon also organized by color.  Above them are photo boxes of photos waiting to find their way into those scrapbooks you saw up above.
IMG_7657 Last pic!  YET MORE sterilite drawers.  These drawers hold big marvy punches, Making Memories paint, miscellaneous tools and embellies that I don't use a ton but still want around, envelopes, more dp scraps and c/s scraps.  The cardboard drawers on top hold all of my stamping around wheels and ink cartridges.  Beside that are misc bottles of things - stamp cleaner, modge podge, etc.  I think my copic air gun is in there too which I have never used yet :0(.
Well, that's it - that's my cozy little space - so what do you think - marshmallow in a piggy bank - hey?! Pin It

1 comment:

  1. Brilliant way to store markers!!! I have been going crazy finding the bet way to keep them organized!

    ReplyDelete

 
Pin It button on image hover