A weekend spent cleaning pays off

What is a crafter to do when there is no room on the table for even a coffee cup?  Clean, of course!

No this isn't a joke, it's a serious mess!

I spent all day Saturday and Sunday sorting, cleaning and generally putting things back where they belong.  I think I have a pretty creative solution to the problem of where to put my stamps after I wash them so they can dry.  I have a double laundry tub and in the "other side" I have a coated wire rack with a dish drainer mat.  Not pretty, but a pretty good use of space.

I wash my stamps with each use.  I just use a soft brush, Palmolive dish soap and warm water.

I've shown pictures of my studio before but I thought I'd try something new.  I made a short video of my space.  Maybe I just really want it documented that it was this clean at one point.  I hope you enjoy the tour.  It starts with the back "wall" of my main space and then goes around the corner into the entry way to the laundry room. 

OMG - is that really what I sound like??  LOL!  I did the tour in stages mostly because it took so long to clean the room.  Part two is the small area just behind my chair.

The main table area is where I spend most of my time in my studio.  When it's clean, there is room for two at the table.  It's a great size for a studio and I feel blessed to have it.  My husband agreed that it could be mine before we even bought the house.  I love it.  And I love it even more when it's clean enough to work in!

Here are my storage cabinets.  You can still get them at Home Depot, but they aren't as nice anymore.  They have really cheapened them up over the last couple of years and they don't have the nice built-in peg board on the doors.

Do you store any of this stuff  you see in a better way?  See something that could use improving? Drop me a line below and let me know.  I'm always looking for ways to have my room be more efficient.  The less time I have to spend looking for things, the more time I have to create!

If you like the blog, please consider following it.  There are two different ways on the right of the page.  I always welcome new followers!  Happy crafting!

Tools of the hobby part two - What I did right

Last month I started a discussion about some of the tools I own for my obsession...um, hobby.  The first part of the conversation was about tools that I purchased and could probably do without.  What I did wrong, if you will.  Well, I'm happy to say that I did make a lot of excellent purchasing decisions, too.  I have some tools that are time savers, some that allow for special techniques and some that I use every single time I sit down at my craft table.  Do I think every rubber stamper/crafter needs them?  Yes and no.  Yes, you need to have tools that are of good quality and allow you to make the art that you want to create.  No, I don't think you need these exact items.  I just think that I do.

CUTTING MAT(S)
I was lucky enough to receive the largest size cutting mat that Michael's sells for Christmas one year.  (Okay, it wasn't really luck.  I cut out the 40% off coupon, grabbed my husband and made him buy it for me.)  It's really big and covers over half of my table.  It's from the sewing department in Michael's and it has ruler measurements and other kinds of cutting templates which don't mean anything to me.  I could cut on it since that's what it's for but it is so pretty that I can't bring myself to do it.  I use it mostly as a table protector and it has saved my table from a couple of major spills.

I have a Fiskars 12x12 cutting mat that I use for making my cards.  It's mapped out in quarter inch lines.  I use this mat every day with my handy Xacto knife to make most of my cards, cut out embellishments and sometimes just to check that a panel really is square.  The back side is shiny and is wonderful for messy projects that need to be painted or for decoupage.  I just pick up the whole mat and move it aside to let projects dry.

CUTTING TOOLS:
There are so many fancy types of scissor on the market that are supposed to be geared to certain kinds of crafts.  Do you know what the best scissors are?  The best pair of scissors are the ones you can grasp comfortably and firmly and use for long periods of time.  I have one pair of standard household 8" scissors that I bought 10 or 15 years ago.  They serve me well.  I can cut small images with them because with the wide handles I have good control.  I can cut cardboard and plastic, tissue paper and tape all with the same pair.  I just keep a bottle of Goo Gone near the sink and clean off the sticky residue from time to time.  I wouldn't replace them with any of the fancy pairs out there.

I have several Xacto knives.  I have been through cheapies that break or where the blades loosen as you cut.  Go for a quality knife and keep a supply of blades on hand.  Just like kitchen knives, sharp blades prevent injuries!  I keep a couple on my table because just like pencils, I tend to misplace them while I'm working.

PAPER TRIMMER
I have a basic Fiskars paper cutter.  It doesn't have a fancy laser or light attached.  It's just a rotary blade that makes my life easier when I am cutting a high volume of paper like when I make my Christmas cards.  I prefer to use my mat & knife but I don't want my arm to fall off, ya know?

DESKTOP SORTERS
It's hard to be creative when you spend all your time rummaging around in desk drawers for the right color marker or a glue stick.  Keep your favorites at hand and make your life easier.

HEAT TOOL
Whether you use it most for embossing, spot drying or stripping paint you need to have a quality tool that you can rely on.  I love my Marvy!  I've had it from the beginning.  It heats evenly and is comfortable to hold.  It also has a built-in safety stand.  Mine has a home in an aluminum can so that I can put it back on the desk even when it's hot.

DESKTOP LAMP
I have an awesome halogen lamp that has two light settings.  It is adjustable and has a wide base to keep it from moving.  You have to be able to see what you're doing when you are working up close.  Plus the halogen is very warm and keeps my fingers toasty in the cold basement where my craft room is!  Invest in a good lamp.  You'll thank me.  

REINKERS
If you use ink pads at all in your crafts I recommend buying a reinker for each one.  Moist stamp pads work best.  These little bottles are worth their weight in gold.

FILING CABINETS
I like the look of the paper sorting towers.  How cute to be able to see my colored paper out in the open, right?  How cute is it when your paper fades?  I have all of my paper in hanging files sorted by color or pattern.  Yeah, I have to take a few minutes at the beginning of a project to pull what I want, but I know it's all going to be the same shade.  My 12x12 is in a plastic cart designed for scrapbookers because I can't find a file cabinet that can accomodate it.  Yet.

COMPUTER WITH SCANNER
I love making the inside sayings for my cards on my computer.  I have a Print Shop program that allows me to print the perfect size to go in my cards.  I have rubber stamps with sayings on them like everyone else does, but I don't like being limited.  My own sense of humor is so corny that I can't always find stamps that say what I want.  It also allows me to personalize the saying.  And I keep a scanned copy of everything in my computer portfolio.  I can recreate designs I've made years ago (or avoid them).

PERSONAL ITEMS FOR COMFORT
Let's face it.  We can spend hours in our crafting space.  Be sure you have the little touches that will make you comfortable while you work.

I have a TV/VCR/DVD.  I can watch regular TV, movies or pop in a project tutorial.   I have a boom box - yes, I know they aren't called that anymore but I'm a dinosaur - so I can listen to music or a book on tape.

I love my mug warmer.  I get so involved in what I'm doing that without it I would be drinking cold coffee every day and who wants that?  I also have the worlds best drink caddy.  It's called and Octopus and is in the automotive section of your local store.  There are arms inside of it which keep even narrow glasses from tipping but it also has a cut out for a mug handle.  And it holds BIG glasses! 


AND FINALLY...DIE CUT/EMBOSSING MACHINE
I will admit that this used to be on my list of things I thought I would never buy.  Last year I went on a weekend retreat and the woman at the next table had a Cuttlebug.  (She had a LOT of fun looking scrapbook stuff.)  Remember the advice from last time about trying equipment first?  Well, I watched her for a day and then asked her to cut out some leaves for me out of my paper.  I had fun with them.  I had a lot of fun.  I asked her questions about the machine and the different things she used it for and she was very helpful.  After I got home I was still thinking about it. Then I found one at Meijer on clearance!  I knew I was meant to have it.  And I've been having fun ever since.  I can't imagine what took me so long!


So, there it is.  My two cents on the tools of the trade, so to speak.  Now I'm going to go pick up that Xacto and get to work on some swap cards.  If you like my blog you can leave a comment or click the little link at the bottom to follow me.  Happy crafting!

Tools of the Hobby part one - What I did wrong

When you're new to any hobby it can be overwhelming as you start to investigate what tools are available.  And because you're new, you have no idea what will become invaluable to you and what will just sit on the shelf collecting dust.  A word to the wise...borrow tools before you purchase.  If your friend has a fancy paper cutter that you think you might want to own, ask to borrow it for a week first.  It may be better than yours and it may not, but you won't know just from looking at it on the shelf in a box.  If your friends don't have it, ask at your local stamp store.  Most of them offer crops on weekends and you can bring your own supplies and try it out there.

Sage advice from an old-timer who has spent more than her fair share on unused stuff.  Good stuff.  Stuff that other crafters love and use all the time.  Just not me.

When do you decide it's time to purge?  Well, I've been stamping since the mid-90's so I think it's time to admit there are items in my cupboards I'm never going to use. I'm not saying don't buy the items below.  Maybe the stuff I will never use will be your go-to tools!  I'm just saying that you may want to be smarter than I am about what you think you "must have" in your collection if you're just getting started in crafting.  You're probably asking yourself why I don't just have a yard sale.  I ask myself that all the time.  I am such a collector of supplies that it is very difficult to let go.  Collector, not hoarder.  Definitely not hoarder.  Right? 

CRIMPER
This tool allows you to add ridges to any sheet of paper.  They come in straight lines or patterns.  Mine is straight.  I have used it on one or two cards.  I find it difficult to attach a panel that has been crimped.  Or should I say that I have trouble keeping it attached?  It's an interesting look but if I bought one sheet of textured scrapbook paper for each of those two cards I would have saved myself some money and I would have one less item taking up space on my pegboard.

PATTERNED SCISSORS
I know scrapbookers love them.  But as a card artist, the need for them just hasn't really come up all that often for me.  I have found that I like the edge punches much better than the scissors.  There is one exception.  Deckle.  I love the deckle edge because it is random and I don't have to worry about lining up the pattern.  I would add corner scissors to this category as well.  Punches are a lot easier to make even.  At least I do use the corner scissors once in a while since I have them.  But if I didn't, I wouldn't miss them.

BLOW PENS
I like the way airbrushed art looks.  Blow pens are a poor-man's version of that.  I have a terrible time trying to get an even spray.  Plus they make me very light-headed.  And since mine came from the toy department they aren't the greatest quality even though they weren't cheap.  Half of them dried out between uses. 

TOOL BOXES WITH LOTS OF COMPARTMENTS
They look great in the hardware stores but unless you have all of your tools and supplies with you while you're shopping for one, odds are that the little sections will end up being the wrong size for what you really need.  Boxes made just for crafters may be a little more expensive than your husband's tool boxes, but they were designed with craft supplies in mind.  I have a tower of unused tool boxes in the corner of the basement.  I'm still searching for the perfect carry-all.  17 years and still searching!

DRAWER ORGANIZER TRAY INSERTS
Seriously...measure the inside dimensions of your desk drawers first!

CRAYOLA MARKERS
Don't get me wrong.  I love Crayola.  Their crayons are awesome!  Their color pencils are okay but the leads are a little hard.  The markers leave prominent streaks when you color on card stock.  It gives my projects a very "unfinished" look to have such choppy coloring.  Luckily, the markers aren't expensive so it was not a big deal.  I only use Crayola markers and colored pencils if I absolutely don't have anything else in the right color. 

GOLD LEAFING MARKERS
They have beautiful colors.  Silver, copper & gold leafing markers make wonderful wide lines and are great for adding a colorful edge to card stock.  Except that they don't set.  You can pick up a piece of paper you drew on a year ago and the ink will still smear.  If you stack your cards together on the table, the card you set on top of the leafing will have smears on the back.  There are ways around the problem.  You can spray it with a fixative.  I just rarely remember to do so.  And you have to store them on their sides, not upright.  And if you don't use them often they dry up.  Ugh.  Too much.  I find it better to make a panel of metallic paper one size larger than the size of the image.  The lines are cleaner and there is no smear issue.

FIBERS IN ALL OF THE COLORS OF THE RAINBOW
I don't use ribbon nearly as often now as I did years ago.  I spent a lot of money on yarns, threads & cords, too.  Nothing wrong with having a stash of fibers, but it just turned out not to be my style to use a lot of them.  That's not something I could have foreseen.  I just wish I hadn't picked up twelve colors of that knobby ribbon just because I had never seen it before.

There are other things.  Certain types of buttons, certain stencils, certain rulers...you get the idea.  Save your money on the fancy tools that you may use only once or twice.

If anyone has ideas on how I can use the items listed above I'd love to hear them.  You might just give me a reason to keep them!

Repurposed Cabinet

We've all seen the slogan, "Reduce. Reuse. Recycle."  I think recycling at home is very important.  And we are so lucky that our local vendor takes all types of plastic instead of just the 1s and 2s. We recycle our newspapers, magazines & junk mail, plastic bottles, glass jars, tin cans & cardboard boxes. 

There are a lot of ways that crafters can re-purpose plastic, glass, wood, metal, and paper in our art.  But today I'm going to talk about giving an old dirty cabinet a new life.  For a few years now my cousin and I have each fantasized about getting a big industrial map cabinet to hold our rubber stamps.  Last summer I decided it was time I did something about that dream.

I found an old cabinet on Craigslist.  It had been stored in a barn which was owned by a fireman out in rural southern Michigan.  The cost was an incredible $250.00.  I felt like I had won the lottery!  At first I thought that I would get it home as fast as possible, wash it up and fill it all in a weekend.  I could have done that and I would still love it.  But I didn't.  I decided to paint it pink and make it the focal point of my craft space.

Let me tell you - this piece of furniture is BIG and it is HEAVY!  And it took me a very long time to get it done.  We left it in segments, hosed them off and dragged them in to the basement.  Each drawer and cabinet section was scrubbed with Brillo and then sanded before they could be painted. 

Fresh off my husband's pickup truck - they all had to be hosed down to get rid of the barn dust & any bugs.

It started out the typical beige - and filthy!

 The room looks so cute now that it is complete and in place but I lived through 6 weeks of chaos.  I couldn't get to my craft table or half of my bins and everyone who had a birthday in the summer months got store bought greeting cards.  The cabinet now houses all of my image stamps and has given me a lot of surface storage, too.  Sadly, I ran out of space and my word stamps are still in the plastic bins.

My space before the map cabinet.

The bins all had to moved out of the way while the cabinet was being completed!

Cabinet body sections took over my laundry room.

The fifteen drawers were propped up everywhere space would allow while they were painted.

Over-sized hardware had to be purchased online.

FINALLY!

My flowers & trees together in one drawer for the first time.

The cabinet helps form the back "wall" of my craft space.

And here it is!  My pride and joy!  Well worth all the hours of work!!

Have you ever re-purposed furniture?  I'd love to hear about your project or what you think of mine.  Drop me a line some time!

Not all crafts (or crafters) are created equal

I've just spent the last two days watching a live feed from the CHA convention in San Diego.  It's a convention for vendors to see and order the new products coming out.  I can't even believe some of the products out there!  I'm basically a rubber stamper.  Although I enjoy trying my hand at other crafts, that's where my passion lies.  I have bins and drawers full of art supplies and embellishments.  I thought I had a pretty good idea of what supplies should be in my cupboard.  HAH!  My head is spinning at the variety of products out there that I have never even heard of.

Today I watched a demo about making jewelry with a "cold enamel" process.  I didn't even know that the traditional method required heat!  Pretty interesting and absolutely beautiful. I saw scrapbook kits, adhesives, die cuts, rubber stamps, paper, clothing, jewelry supplies, etc.  Even though I think it was all super cool I know that I won't be good at everything I try.  And, quite frankly, I can't afford to try everything that looks interesting.  But that's not what crafting is about.  It's not a contest to see who can be good at the most things.

I can't sew - I can barely thread a needle.  I can't weld, solder or make pottery - the thought of handling anything that gets that hot or deals directly with fire frightens me.  And I'm pretty sure my city has ordinances prohibiting my owning a forge or kiln in my garage.  But I can make cards.  I like making greeting cards for my family and friends because I like the idea of making someone smile. Just a friendly little reminder that they are in my thoughts.  We all love getting mail that isn't just bills and sales flyers, right?  And if it's pretty mail...all the better!

So try some things and find the outlet that makes you happy.  You don't have to try every technique or have "all the toys".  You just need to keep an open mind and find what makes you happy.

"Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life." - Picasso