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A huge lesson I learned was take a good photo inventory ... on Oct 6th my home burned and I lost everything. Inventory for insurance was very rough.
Oh, I'm so sorry! I hope you've come a long way toward rebuilding your life after that loss in the last three months. Thanks for sharing your good advice.
What a great thread. Here's a few lessons I've learned (that I sometimes have to relearn...)
-just because a thousand stampers can work miracles with a particular product, doesn't mean I can.
-free shipping with a minimum purchase /sales/coupons/ can be more costly in the long run than just buying what I love
-being on a design team isn't for everyone. it can be very stressful.
-stamping as part of an internet community doesn't have to be a competition to be popular, to have everything, or to be the first to have everything.
-stampers are some of the kindest, most generous people in the world.
-give my cards away. if I don't have a particular use, I send them in boxes to one of the charities that collects them. makes me feel so much better about the hobby.
-apparently, it is necessary to have 7 different kinds of black ink.
-don't be the first person to buy a new tool. let someone else buy the newest release, go through the recall, etc., read the reviews and then wait for version 2, which will be better and cheaper!
-stamping and papercrafting is a legitimate hobby; buying just to collect is not.
- sell or give away what you don't use, but keep what you love even if it isn't considered trendy.
-rub on sentiments are a terrific way to get white sentiments on dark cardstock. much easier than embossing!
-I print out in B&W copies of cards I love and have them in a binder to use as inspiration for layouts.
-wood mounted stamps and clear stamps and rubber on ez foam are all part of my rainbow coalition!
-it is much harder for me to make a "simple" card than to make one with multiple layers, etc.
__________________ Dear Paperlicious is my blog...with a series on how I'm learning to improve my cardmaking by studying others.
Ronni - I wish someone like you visited my local hobby stores when I have been shopping, maybe I would not have some of the strange things I have now - LOL!!!
Things I have learned...
1) Saving scraps is a good idea...but using them is a better idea! My scrap file is so plump and full, divided by SU color families...I love pulling them out when I want to make a few simple cards
2) My hand coordination is poor...so some techniques are impossible for me (or they look very bad!) but that's OK! I have my own style!
3) Some images are cute for a certain card...doing image swaps with friends gives me some nice things to put on one or 2 cards without spending money on an entirely new stamp/set.
4) Having great music while stamping is almost as important as great lighting! ;)
5) Even though I recently started buying more DP...and I do love it...I still treasure the fun in stamping out my own dp, then make a coordinated set of cards. Probably my all-time favorite project!
6) People really do love to receive hand crafted cards with hand written notes...so send them out!
7) While SCS may be highly addicting, dangerous to my budget (I never heard of Our Daily Bread Designs, There She Goes, etc before), damaging to my sleep (I chat late nights waaaaayyy too often)...it is still the BEST place to come for creative ideas, tutorials, and new friends who actually "get" it! :mrgreen:
__________________ Kim in Illinois, Dirty Dozen Alum, QFTD#207, FS798, VSN Moderator "Famous Last Words" Spring Virtual Stamp Night, April 19 & 20
I have just fallen in love with the light, solid, white, foam/rubber/plastic ~~ whatever they are made of ~~ stamps. They are inexpensive and they work just as well as the wooden backed ones. These are not the ones that you mount onto wood or use with an acrilic block. They are used in just the same as the wood backed ones.
They are so detailed. Best used with a Stazon ink pad. There are some really beautiful images. I believe they come from the states and the only place we can get them from is the TV shopping channell QVC.
The images mainly look rather old fashioned, taditional; pensive young ladies, dancing, maid and butler, They are so neat. Has anyone else used them??
I've been stamping for about 5 years now. It all started with ONE Stampin' Up demo, and I've been hooked ever since.
1. I agree with all of you that you shouldn't buy a set when you're only in love with one stamp in it. I have learned to only buy what I like, no matter what company it comes from. Even then, taste changes, and I have stamps that I liked, are cute, but not my style.
2. Don't buy full size ink pads if cubes or drops are available. I have an entire drawer full of pads that have been used once, or never at all, just because it was a new color in the line.
3. Only create when you're in the mood. Nothing works when you try to force it. You'll only waste your time and supplies. And when you're in the mood....order pizza for dinner! It won't kill your family, and you can go on creating.
4. I tend to make individual cards when I need them, but when the creative mood strikes, go with it. My grown daughter loves to get packs of cards that cover all occasions as a "just because" gift. Or give a pack to an elderly neighbor or friend...it saves what little cash they have, makes them feel special, and saves a special trip to the store just to buy a card. The smile you receive in return pays for the materials you used ten times over.
Wonderful posts! I've learned that if I don't keep my work area neat and organized that my hobby is really organizing craft supplies instead of making things! I use a variety of mason jars and other clear containers to sort and organize my supplies by color so that they are displayed and I can see and use them. Also I have finally leanred to budgt my time and wallet- and I now shop with a list instead of just walking up and down the aisles.
Late Blossom, when you say you organize your embellisments by color what do you mean? Are all of your pink eyelets, brads, ribbons, etc all in one container/place? Do you have pics?
Wow ~ this is a great question and I can't wait to read some of the answers . . . and you are reading my mind with the first four on your list!!
(I don't have that many embellishments, so I have never tried #5!)
I definitely am more discerning in what stamps I choose. I do like a wide variety but I'm finding now that I only buy what I know I love and I will use. I haven't had a stamp-buying regret in a long time.
It is really liberating to start using up those supplies ~ there will always be something wonderful, right? And it's sort of the same thing as trying to use all of your stamps. If you don't get to using it, you'll never find out what works for you and what you really love the most.
I'm glad, too, that I have plenty of cool stuff to choose from ~ but I do wish I didn't get quite as many SU ink pads so I'd have more room for others I'm liking now. And I wish I didn't have quite so much SU cardstock ~ I need to get into a mass-producing phase and make a dent in it.
I'm also learning that as much as I fall in love with all kinds of DP, I can make my own with backgrounders and other stamps.
Going unmounted was one of the best organizational decisions I've made. I have a relatively small stamp space so this was crucial. It's another reason I have to be very careful with what I purchase.
Thanks for starting this thread, Susan!
I am not sure how many of you all do this already but I think it would be fun and economically sensible (do any of us stampaholics have economic sense? LOL) to have a swap get together. Get other stampers/scrappers together occassioanlly to swap paper, ink, embellies, maybe even stamps. Even if you don't swap maybe do crazy great prices for each other. Just a thought! Blessings!
__________________ Anne Arrowsmith "but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind...I press on toward the the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." Phil 3:13b-14
I have just fallen in love with the light, solid, white, foam/rubber/plastic ~~ whatever they are made of ~~ stamps. They are inexpensive and they work just as well as the wooden backed ones. These are not the ones that you mount onto wood or use with an acrilic block. They are used in just the same as the wood backed ones.
They are so detailed. Best used with a Stazon ink pad. There are some really beautiful images. I believe they come from the states and the only place we can get them from is the TV shopping channell QVC.
The images mainly look rather old fashioned, taditional; pensive young ladies, dancing, maid and butler, They are so neat. Has anyone else used them??
You've piqued my curiosity. But, I've been searching QVC and not found the stamps you referenced above. Do you have a direct link to this product?
__________________ Julie Ebersole (JulieHRR once upon a time . . . )julieebersole.com"So shines a good deed in a weary world." -Willy Wonka
I am a newbie. I have many many many many stamps in my stash that are several years old, and I just dont use them. I joined this board so I can use the hydrangea stamp I bought on my sons wedding album I am making for me, with some intelligence.
I thank the OP for this thread. I will follow this eagerly. I am also enjoying the whole MB.
Two things for me - when I get the new catty, I go through it and mark everything I think I have to have. Then I put the catty away for a week or so, and go through it again - it's surprising what has already lost it's appeal!
The second is to go onto the different challenge pages, find cards I really like and CASE them - I end up with cards that I really like. (I'm not really creative, so it helps to be guided a bit!) I also tend to make a few of every card that I really like, so I've always got something to send out on a moment's notice.
The second is to go onto the different challenge pages, find cards I really like and CASE them - I end up with cards that I really like. (I'm not really creative, so it helps to be guided a bit!) I also tend to make a few of every card that I really like, so I've always got something to send out on a moment's notice.
SO many people say this and it is so dang SMART!! Why is it that I never do this :rolleyes: ?!?! Ugh. I don't care for mass-producing anything ~ except, I have learned, if it's one layer. But making an extra or two extra? I NEED to learn to do that!! It's a great idea.
I have learned so many of these lessons myself - the hard way of course. After learning my lesson a few times, I am not so quick to jump on the bandwagon for a "must have" tool. I now wait a while and really think about whether or not I'll use it, etc. It took me a year to decide whether or not to get an ATG gun! Now that I have one, I absolutely love it and there is no going back!
I am a consultant for CTMH, and love how everything coordinates. For this reason, I limit how much paper I buy at my LSS. I found that I was buying paper because I loved it, but often had trouble finding a cardstock that coordinated well enough for me to be happy. So it was usually a waste of money. So now I make sure it will coordinate with the CTMH cs I have or that I can find a color of bazzil to coordinate with it. I waste much less now.
I too am working on using up my stash and am determined to quit hoarding. If anyone wishes to join me, I have posted a "use it up" challenge on my blog. www.missioninkpossible.blogspot.com Anyone is welcome to join the challenge. I will be doing it each month for the rest of the year. More artwork for my challenge will be coming soon.
ITA about the comments about quality. You get what you pay for. Quality is so worth it! Oh, and it's nice to know I'm not alone in the mistakes I have made, and the lessons learned. I try whenever possible to share my knowledge with others so they don't have to learn it the hard way.
Wow using every stamp image you own is a big challenge!! I have enjoyed reading all the ideas and solutions, and have laughed more than once! Ive been stamping for 8 years and learn new things all the time, here are the mistakes I have learned the hard way
1. I will never ever use all the purple cs and ink I HAD to get to complete a color family!!! In fact a couple of those purple inks have never been open!
2. not all circle cutters are created equally...ask me I have had 3 or 4 that dont work very well at all... sure wish I knew about scs back then.
3.I loved the images of a couple of acrylic sets and snapped em up and a clear block to mout them on, only to discover Im a rubber and wood girl, prolly would have made sense to try ONE before investing 30.00!
4. I dont LOVE every stamp I own, and face it we are doing more than storing a bunch of craft stuff, we live in our homes we pay for every square inch of that space, we really should only share our space and our lives with the things we LOVE... That goes for the craft room too!!
Late Blossom, when you say you organize your embellisments by color what do you mean? Are all of your pink eyelets, brads, ribbons, etc all in one container/place? Do you have pics?
Yes. I organize all the little tiny stuff like brads and hardware in various bead boxes. This system (which I stole from scrapbooking guru Stacy Julian) works great for me...I use all my stuff so much more. One exception is ribbon, which I store in glass jars I bought at Target on a shelf above my desk and in plain sight. The ribbons are sorted by color, too.
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-apparently, it is necessary to have 7 different kinds of black ink.
...
Amen...I have Brilliance, Memories, StazOn, SU, Versamagic, Palette, Ancient Page, ColorBox, and a couple others I can't remember right now. AND I USE THEM ALL! Definitely necessary.
Location: Brandon, South Dakota*in my color studio
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WOW!!! This has been awesome to read all of your wonderful ideas. I couldn't stop reading until I got to the end.
The last 2 weekends our oldest daughter has come home and we spent most of our time together crafting with items both of us bought the previous holiday season and never touched. We did need to make 1 run to the craft stores, but only bought several small ticket items for the projects we were making over the weekend. We did not get sidetracked, but did take the time to walk down each isle for inspiration and ideas.
* I agree with the idea that you need to be able to see your items. I love my Clip It Up system that I purchased quit some time ago. It doesn't take up much room. I just spin it and I can see the embellishments that I have on hand. I have them in bags hanging from the clips, sorted in catagories.
* I also make sure I clean up at the end of the project or if time is short, I clean up before I start the next project. This sure does help when my space is clean and organized. Helps my thought process be the same.
* I sure wish I would have made a system for the stamp sets that I have when I started hoarding stamp sets. My daughter has hers all in a binder and with each stamp set she has the ideas she has printed right behind the stamp set. Wish she lived closer to do mine. It would take me days to tackle this kind of organization, but I would love it.
* My crafting friends that get together as much as possible, have decided to call ourselves each others support team for our paper hoarding habits.
* It seems that lately it is easier for me to make paper crafting items such as cards, decorations, embellishments, etc. rather than scrapbook. Takes less time and quicker gratification. However, I love scrapbooking and thoroughly enjoy it when my kids look at their albums.
* I totally agree that it is better to buy nicer items rather than the less expensive sometimes. I absolutely love by cricut expression and my bigshot. They have helped my make my own embellishments, rather than always buying things in the wrong colors. SU! has truly made that easier with their products that all mix and match so well together.
I have rattled on long enough. I hope others take the time to read everyones wonderful ideas. TFS everyone.
__________________ Renee - SU! Demonstrator [url]http://reneefick.stampinup.net[/url www.marykay.com/rfick
I love spending as much time as possible in my Color Studio
-stamping as part of an internet community doesn't have to be a competition to be popular, to have everything, or to be the first to have everything.
I think I need to print this out and attached it to my monitor! I'm always checking my comment, view, & favorite counts and I have to remember that if I like a card I made, then that's all that matters, even if no one else recognizes my genius ;)
Also, has anyone read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell yet? One of his big points is you are an expert after 10,000 hours of practice--I always have to remember I've been doing this for 6 months, so of course people that have been doing it for 6 years or 16 years can do more advanced techniques than me!
But my one big lesson I've learned is a line I "borrowed" from Santino on Project Runway--"Lighten up, it's just paper!"
Yes. I organize all the little tiny stuff like brads and hardware in various bead boxes. This system (which I stole from scrapbooking guru Stacy Julian) works great for me...I use all my stuff so much more. One exception is ribbon, which I store in glass jars I bought at Target on a shelf above my desk and in plain sight. The ribbons are sorted by color, too.
Oh, you are SOOOO good. Jealous much? Yes I am! You go girl I love your organization!
__________________ Anne Arrowsmith "but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind...I press on toward the the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." Phil 3:13b-14
Amen...I have Brilliance, Memories, StazOn, SU, Versamagic, Palette, Ancient Page, ColorBox, and a couple others I can't remember right now. AND I USE THEM ALL! Definitely necessary.
And I also have Memento, India Ink, Marvy, Adirondack, Distress Ink all in black. And I also use them all. Aaugh!!!!!
__________________ Keep what is worth keeping
and with the breath of kindness
blow the rest away.
Oh, you are SOOOO good. Jealous much? Yes I am! You go girl I love your organization!
Hey, you can do it, too! ;)
It was hard at first to take the plunge and separate everything by color, but it's been over a year now and I can't believe I didn't do it sooner. No more forgetting I've got something...I just open the drawer of the color I need and voila, all sorts of inspiration hits, LOL!
It was hard at first to take the plunge and separate everything by color, but it's been over a year now and I can't believe I didn't do it sooner. No more forgetting I've got something...I just open the drawer of the color I need and voila, all sorts of inspiration hits, LOL!
I love the idea of being able to find all of the embellies that I have for the colors I am doing on a project. You are right when you say we forget what we have. I may be stuck for an idea and seeing it all in one spot makes it soooo much easier to get unstuck.
Thank you for the inspiration. I'm gonna do it...I'm goin' in...I will have to tell my DH to send a search party if I don't surface by Sunday evening! LOL!;)
__________________ Anne Arrowsmith "but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind...I press on toward the the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." Phil 3:13b-14
I have stopped buying on impulse. I take my time now and revisit websites half a dozen times before I actually buy. I have so many stamps that I really don't know what to do with cos I bought them on impulse.
Yes. I organize all the little tiny stuff like brads and hardware in various bead boxes. This system (which I stole from scrapbooking guru Stacy Julian) works great for me...I use all my stuff so much more. One exception is ribbon, which I store in glass jars I bought at Target on a shelf above my desk and in plain sight. The ribbons are sorted by color, too.
I have the advantage of living in Germany right now, so there is no Michael's or Hobby Lobby for me to go to! Oh I was a sucker for those HUGE paper packs that were always half (or more) off! So I invite my friends over and let them go through it all the time. I'm never going to use all of that!
As for the magazines, my husband has car magazines dating back to 1998. (He's the hoarder in the family...though I'm not totally innocent!) What we started doing was taking them apart and scanning the articles he wanted, then recycling the paper. They were only collecting dust in the house, and now they are taking up just a little space on the computer. Really a space saver, and it gets you to actually look at the article again and realize why you wanted to save it in the beginning.
I too bit the bullet and sorted all my embellishments into color families, not quite as consisely but it still works. My biggest lesson that I am still working on learning is to corral all my stuff because the more time I spend looking for my stuff, the less time I spend using it!
- organisation, both of my supplies/stash and of my work space. If they are organised it is so much easier for me to find what I'm after and for me to keep what I'm doing straight in my head.
- organising my papers and inks into colour families, ie - pinks, reds, green, blues etc. I've done mine like a rainbow, it's so much easier to find the green I'm looking for if they're all together.
- keeping my work space clean. It stops things from a previous project transferring to the next one.
- sharing what I have with others, both my supplies and my knowledge. You'd be amazed at what you pick up from others by doing that. They will also have suggestions or ideas that you hadn't thought of to use to do with your own supplies.
- giving away your excess to charities, it puts a smile on a less fortunate's face and shares the joy.
__________________
The task ahead of us is never as great as the Power behind us. - Amen! Fan Club Member
I have learned to start any project as early as possible.
That way I don't have to mail a card that I don't really like.
Putting a card aside, and letting a few hours or even a day go by before I look at it again allows me to look at it with a fresh perspective each time I take it out to work on it.
I can refine or improve the card each time I take it out until I am satisfied with the composition and balance. If I make a birthday card, I can let it sit on my desk for a few days before I have to send it. If I like it I can enjoy looking at it for those few days before I have to mail it. More often, I decide I can do better, and I make improvements or even do another, better card. (Sometimes I mail the first, sort of nice card and keep the improved one for future inspiration.)
A lesson I just learned is that while doing things "by eye" is great for some projects, somethings need to be a little more precise. I just discovered a centering ruler for less than $2.00 and now my projects never end up crooked or lopsided.
