I was distressed about how to store my Tim Holtz distress inks and stains until today. Tim recently came out with a couple of storage solutions, one being the “Cargo Case.”

(FYI, we still have a couple in stock at Clipper Street for $47.99 if you still want one… You could also get it on sale today for 40% off too!) Anyway.. I broke down and bought one today. I was hesitating buying it because I like to have my stuff visible – so I use it – which would mean if I bought this I would be looking at finding enough space on my desk to have it open all the time…

Here’s what I’ve settled on for the time being. This is what I’ve filled it with:

Note that I used the “lid” as usable storage space.

And here’s how it’s oriented on my table:

So right now it has the place of honour right next to my craft mat and we’ll see how it goes. I don’t have an issue with re-organizing my space every few weeks if it doesn’t work for me. Right now I’m really into the distress ink thing but that may change in a little while… Who knows!

I don’t know about you, but one question I get asked the most when I am teaching card-making classes is “What supplies do you use?” I love to see everyone bring their essential supplies to my classes because it’s always so interesting to me what everyone uses. Some people use those old photo squares to adhere their layers, some people cut cardstock with scissors and a ruler (GASP!) and what I love is no two people have the same supplies.

Today I’m going to share with you MY essential supplies – just tools – and I would love to hear what you think! For the most part I have purchased all of my supplies from my LSS, but I will try to give you some links in case you want to try some of these products out for yourself. And FYI, I’m not endorsing any products for compensation, I genuinely love these tools and after 5 years of card-making have deemed these MY FAVOURITES!

1. Ott-lite. I remember when I used to craft underneath my dining-room chandelier. Stamping was a night-mare, colouring was worse… I couldn’t see anything clearly. The Ott-lite is beautiful, sunny light and I love it for two reasons: clarity while I’m crafting, and lighting for my photos.
2. Crop-a-Dile Corner Chomper. It’s a corner rounder that goes through multiple layers of cardstock, chipboard, metal, ANYTHING your heart desires, as well as cleanly cutting a single sheet of cardstock. No effort to squeeze, and two sizes of rounded corners.
3. Marvy Squishy Scissors. I do have a number of pairs of scissors, but these are my go-to pairs for cardmaking. I have one pair for paper, and one pair for ribbon (I’ve tied a piece of ribbon around the pair for ribbon), this keeps the blades sharp. NEVER MIX YOUR PAPER SCISSORS WITH YOUR FABRIC SCISSORS. Trust me. I’ve had these for 2+ years and they’re still as sharp as the day I bought them.
4. This to That foam adhesive by American Crafts. The. Best. Dimensionals. Ever. They are easy to pick up, easy to peel off the backing, sturdy, thick, and very strong. I buy them in bulk when they’re on sale because I never, EVER want to run out of these.
5. Glue Glider Pro. I have found this to be a really great, quick adhesive. It’s like a small ATG gun. You buy the gun/glue together one time, then when the glue runs out you buy refills. The one thing I’ll say is the refills aren’t cheap, but I love it enough to suck it up and pay the price. I don’t know about you, but I’ve tried every adhesive under the sun and when you find something that works you stick with it, no pun intended!
6. Sookwang Tape – some of you may call it “scor tape”. If you use this to glue something down, it’s not coming off. Period. lol.. It’s seriously strong adhesive. I love it for ribbon, altered items/mini albums, adhering heavy layers. It’s great stuff and available in lots of thicknesses.
7. Tonic Guillotine (pronounced GEE-uh-teen with a hard “G”). How many trimmers have you purchased in your crafty lifetime? This is probably the 10th trimmer I’ve purchased and it’s definitely my last. It cuts straight, there’s an extension arm so I can measure up to 12x12 when I need to but it only takes up 6x12, it NEVER goes dull (no expensive replacement blades) and it’s very sturdy. I’ve had it for about two years and I’ve had no problems with wear-and-tear. The only downside is it’s more expensive than your standard trimmer, but you will NEVER have to buy another blade ever again!
8. L Letterpress cleaning cloths. Cleaning stamps has been an experiment in patience. Like trimmers and adhesives I think I’ve tried everything from spray cleaners to scrubbing pads to baby wipes to washing by hand. I like the baby-wipe method the most but was frustrated with small fibers left behind on the stamp. The fibers would get in the way of a clean stamped image often and I was looking for a new solution. Enter letterpress cloths. They are exactly like a baby wipe but the formula is made to remove ink – not poo (click to see a comparison)! The cloths also give off very little fibers so I am totally happy! I reuse the wipes until they are dry or un-useable and I am still on my first box of wipes after 6 months!

 

So there you have it! If you have any questions about the products I’ve mentioned feel free to leave a comment. If you’re curious about anything else I use on a regular basis (inks, embossing gun etc etc..) again, just leave a comment.

I hope this has been helpful… Thanks for stopping by!

That's me!! Well... Not really, but as the years go by and as the scrap paper grows I am constantly adapting how I do things around here. Previous to this organization I had my papers in a rubbermaid tub and had them loosely organized by colour in rainbow order (Roy G. Biv hahaha) and it looked like this:

It was alright. The problems I ran into were: I forgot what I had, I didn't go to the tub as often because I couldn't SEE everything, and after a while I got lazy and didn't file them EXACTLY where they were supposed to go (aka I just threw it all in the front).

So! What did I do? Well I've seen a couple forums on Splitcoast about cutting paper down to usable pieces right away if you know you're going to use it for cards.. Well, I occasionally scrapbook so I don't cut my papers right away, but once they're in the scrap bin? I probably won't use it on a layout. So I thought, what the hay! I'm gonna cut down all my patterned paper scraps and this is what I got:

There was a thread on splitcoast I was talking in that centred around storage of nestabilities. I saw this idea on the web somewhere, and stole it!!! It was kind of frustrating to put it together, and more expensive than I'd bargained, but I love having my dies out in the open so I can just walk over to the wall with my image I want to cut out and hold it up against all of my choices..  You can see I don't have a lot of nesties, but I am happy with my collection, and don't often find myself wishing for a different shape. Materials:

Bulleting Board. (It cost me about $35!!!) like this one

Magnetic Sheets (about $15)  like these

I used Zip Dry adhesive to glue the sheets to the dry erase board, and voila!

The second thing I want to show you is my CD rack I use to hold many of my unmounted and clear sets. I have two binders full of stamps, but I would love to move all of them to this kind of storage because I'm really liking, again, SEEING my stamps. I use things more when I can see them..


The rack is from Ikea. In Canada it's $16.99... Find it here. It hold 35 cds.. My problem right now is I don't have a lot of empty jewel cases.. That's what I need to buy when I go out next!!

t's not ideal, but this is where I create. I currently live in a two bedroom condo with my son and my fiance, so space is tight. I have taken over the "dining room" and it is now my stamping/scrapbooking/office/music space. Takes the word multi-functional to a new level.


This is the table where I stamp. I refinished it myself a couple years ago and it's actually a nice table to stamp on. I do, however, stamp on a basic grey magnetic mat to protect the table. The stuff that surrounds the mat always changes, but the Making Memories carousel and cutter always remain.

Behind me to my left is my paper rack. Each section can hold about 200 pieces of 12x12 paper so I've divided my paper up by brand. There are some brands (Basic Grey) that I've divided up by line because I've had 100+ pieces just in that one line (Blush and Scarlet's Letter to name a few).


















This is my newest organizational addition. I have wanted a clip-it-up for a LONG time, but my LSS's don't carry them (and won't be brining them in) so I asked my mom to check out the price in the US. It was $60 and I just didn't want to pay that, so I got her to buy me two packs of clips (100 for $13) and I found this picture display apparatus (by Umbro for $25) that resembled the clip-it-up, so I bought it and tried it out. It's not as stable as I imagine the clip-it-up would be, but it's a heck of a lot cheaper.

I am *in LOVE* with my ribbon storage solution, so I thought I would share it with you.. The components used are: 1 fishing tackle box (acquired at a local hardware store) and embellishment containers by Cropper Hopper. My LSS carries them, but my Mom also picked up a butt-load of them for me from Jo-anns.. They come in a pack of 12 and are about $3 a pack. So here is my system:
Isn't it SO pretty?! And the thing I like about storing ribbon this way is the ribbon is neatly coiled, so there is no need for ironing out crinkly ribbon. I also can't afford to buy ribbon by the spool like a lot of people on SCS do, so this way I can store my measly 1-2 yards of ribbon in a practical way. There are a lot of different-sized ribbon, so I've shown you up-close how I wrap the different sizes:








The medium-sized ribbon (what most ribbons come in) are stored with a little bit of it hanging out, so when I go to use it I can just pull out the length I need and it stays in the container. The other two sizes (small and large) can be stored side-by-side with like ribbon, or on its own if it's big enough.. If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

Now for a couple of cards:

*visit my SCS gallery for detailed recipe. Have a great day!