Storing Clear and Unmounted Rubber Stamps Tutorial

Good Evening!

I would like to say thanks for the lovely comments I've had about my newly refurbed craft room. It has always been a joy to work in there, and I know I'm very lucky to have a room of my own. I've often joked that if I had a gas hob and a shower in there I would never need to leave my room!

I'm going to be showing you how I did the lettering and vinyl decal over the next week or so, but I had a question as to exactly how I store my clear stamps after I posted a piccy of my CD's which you can see here, so I thought I would do a kind of tutorial to show you exactly how I do this.

 Here's my folder where I keep all my images of my clear and unmounted rubber stamps. I try and keep this {as much as I can} in occasion categories such as Christmas, girly, masculine, flowers, sentiments etc. The folder allows me to add new sheets within a category whenever I get new stamps. It was my aim once I'd got this system up and running to stamp and categorise them as soon as they were bought, and get them into the CD's , but with the best laid plans this hasn't happened, and at the moment I must have about 100 packs of clear stamps to sort categorise and store! So this is how my system works.

 I take my set of stamps, and decide which category it will fit most. In this case I'm storing the 'Born to Shop Go Green' stamp set, so in this case it will go in my girly section. I'm using the lid of an A5 storage box as an acrylic block, placing all my stamps onto this to stamp onto a piece of white card. I used to stamp them with an acrylic block, but found placing, inking stamping and cleaning took so long, it's much quicker this way and just as effective, after all you only need to make out the image, it doesn't have to be perfect. I use a dye based black ink so it dries quickly too.

When I use a lid instead of an acrylic block, I make sure that I press down within the lid to get the best impression possible.

If some of the images don't come out fully, it doesn't bother me, after all it's only as a reference point to remember what stamps I have. Can you imagine trying to find a particular stamp with all your CD's on a rack together - it would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack!

I use CD cases to store all my stamps. I get my cases from a local printers for about 20p each, but you can also get them from Tesco {and other leading Supermarkets, I'm sure!} in packs of 10, I usually pay about £3.50 here. Please note: You need to get the normal size CD cases, not the jewel, slim CD cases as these are not thick enough to store even Clear stamps and therefore will not close. Remove the inner section where you normally would store the CD by prizing at the spine edge carefully. This can be discarded {unless you can find another use for it of course!}.

Once my stamping is complete, I 'stick' the clear stamps {or unmounted rubber on ezymount} onto the inside of the cases. This is why I have the stamped record of the image in an easy to find way. Both sides of the CD case can be covered with clear stamps, meaning that depending on the size of the set, you can group some together. Rubber stamps on ezymount can only cover one side because of their thickness.

The stamped sheet is then given a number, and I also make labels with my Brother label printer to stick on the spine of the CD case. The CD's will be in numerical order on the shelf, but not necessarily in the folder as they will be put in their particular category.

 If the CD case only contains a particular stamp set then I will also write the name on the spine too.

Now, I hear you ask, what do I do with the lovely images printed onto acetate that illustrates the stamp set? Well, sometimes I cut to size so it will fit into the CD case, but usually I make a card from it!

I made this card using the acetate image of the topiary tree from the packaging, and fixed it to white glitter cardstock using red glitter brads. In fact all of this card is made with scraps! I LOVE making cards from scraps and recycled items! I made the sentiment panel on my laptop, as can you believe I must have about 500 sets of clear stamps, and I've counted 547 woodmounted stamps, and I HAVEN'T GOT a new home stamp?!! The mind boggles!

Supplies: Image: Topiary Tree from packaging of 'Born to Shop Go Green' Papers & Cardstock: Born to Shop Go Green A5 Paper Pack; Papermania Glitter Cardstock; Core'dinations black & white cardstock; Greeting: Made with fonts Accord light SF and LD Charming Bold.

Well, I really hope you found that truly helpful! I enjoyed doing it, and at least it was another stamp set confined to a CD case!

Best Wishes Birdie!

Hi there!

Here I am again! I couldn't wait to get back on here blogging.

With me being away with work, I haven't had a chance to craft anything new for you - so I hope you don't mind me sharing a card I made for Project of the Week on docrafts.com a good few month's ago. It's made using the patterned papers from the Born to Shop Nostalgia Collection {which I love}, and one of the Anita's wood mounted stamps, coloured with Kurecolor alcohol based markers. I embossed the pink patterened paper with a polka dot embossing folder before sanding to bring forward the white core of the paper. The scalloped edge is made using 2 inch circles fixed to the back of the pink filigree paper. I really like the contrast between the black circles and the colours on the card.

Well, we have one day of filming Creativity TV left, and I don't know why but I'm so tired - I think I might be coming down with something. Yesterday I finished filming with Phill Martin, and Sheila arrived ready for our filming today. Phill and I had such a hoot, and the same can be said for Sheila and I today too! Maybe that's why I'm so tired - too much laughing!

Last night sheila and I had a lovely meal at the Hop Pole, a 16th Century pub just at the bottom of the drive of the hotel - I had steak pie and I have never seen a pie so big! We were both shattered and dropping off to sleep,  I couldn't resist any longer and I turned out the light at 9.30pm, almost unheard of for me!I slept soundly until 7.30am, a veritable lie in! I'm still shattered tonight though - hope I feel better in the morning! I still have things to do to get ready for the Stitch and Craft Show at Olympia.

Anyhoo, that's all for moi tonight - have a great night whatever you're up to - and thanks for coming to visit!

There May Be Trouble Ahead....

Ooo, I hate it when I've been away from my blog now for a couple of days - now that I've got back into it of course! It's like I have an addiction and get the DT's when I just can't find the time to make a post. Yet, here I am, sticky and tired due to the weather and work load, 'cos I just couldn't stay away any longer!

Yesterday was new Challenge of the week day over on the docrafts site, and this week it's the turn of the sketch challenge. Why not have a go? Click here to see the sketch! Normally I don't get time to make a card with the sketch, but this time I was itching to do a card with the sketch, so here it is.

I've used NEW Papers and cardstock stickers from the Born to Shop Bubbles Range (BTS) from docrafts - I really love the whole range; it's so me darling! And another thing I love are the new decorative scissor range from xcut - my fave being the bell scissors which cut this super cute border to my cardstock and paper! Also Papermania have these gorgeous new embossing folders for use in die cutting machines, there are 10 designs to choose from, and they're an absolute bargain at £2.99!!

I've embellished the card with a couple of flowers from the capsule collection, and some Alphamini foam letters which I ♥ !The glitter scalloped circle and strip are from the BTS cardstock stickers, which come pre-cut - so no fiddly cutting out - winner!

Now onto our Wootton Posse trip to Alton Towers/ Splash Landings. As I've mentioned in a previous post, there was drama afoot, which is usually the case where I'm involved. I remembered the tickets, the hotel reservations, the postcode and sat nav, and the sun cream. It was when we were on the Park that the 'fun' started! First I'll set the scene....

It would be rude not to introduce you to the 'Wootton Posse'! Here we Have Michelle (creator of those gorgeous cupcakes!) with her children; David (the hubby), with Joe in front; And Richard with Sue, with Richard's elder daughter Megs, and then their two younger children. Can you spot who's missing. Yes. Me. Cos I always have to take the photographs. As you can see though, I have left space next to Michelle, just in case I ever have the inclination to superimpose me into the photo. No, it's not a bad case of cropping at all. Definitely not. Look at those two in the background, studying that map like it's a reconnaissance mission - go boys!!!

Joe on arrival at the park, quite evidently nonchalant at the thought of a weekend of fun. What shall I do with him?

Can you believe that someone had been silly enough to joy ride some type of ranshack vehicle into the reception area of Splash Landings, and the staff haven't even had it removed??? And the police have even taken the liberty of clamping it! House Keeping - Stat!

I loved these, what an ingenious and inspiring way to use umbrellas - as light shades. I Don't think David was over impressed however when I mentioned this would look good in our new hallway. And open umbrellas inside? I should have known this spelled O-M-E-N.

This is Ringo, the Splash Landings resident Racoon (don't all hotels have Racoons? - well, maybe in America). Joe in the past hasn't been keen on over sized furry dressed up people, as I found out after a two hour wait to meet Mickey Mouse and friends a couple of years ago - but things look promising for this years trip to Disney World. Yahoo!

Love this crest as you go into THE actual Towers of Alton themselves. Probably not original, as you can probably see the difference in colour from the tower to the lion, but there we are - still impressive stone masonry whenever it was carved! We were waiting to go on the ride 'HEX', a ride that is supposedly haunted, and about a curse that an old beggar woman placed on the Earl of Shropshire who lived at Alton Towers way back when. Are you still with me? LOVE anything like that!

Anyway, now onto the drama, drama, drama! After a lovely day of us all parading around the theme park, we decided that we would split into three separate groups to get on the last rides of the day. Sue and her daughter, Michelle and daughter, and myself and Joe went off to go on one of the fast rides, and a couple of the smaller ones. We went on the Sky ride (cable car to you and me), and once off we started walking to the rides. About a minute later, Sue said "where's Joseph?" - we spun around... and he was no where to be seen.

Now, have you ever had that feeling where you just go white and you can feel panic start to set in, but you know you must be logical and rational? Well, that was me. We immediately all split up and started re-tracing our steps, how could he have gone far - we'd only walked about 50 yards but we just couldn't find him. Only about 90 seconds had passed but we just couldn't find him.

We went to one of the members of staff and as I couldn't speak, Michelle said ' We've lost a child - what's the quickest way of getting him back?" and the man said "To where?" As you can imagine, I was filled with confidence. Then I said - "I've lost my little boy, he's only five". Once he knew what we were on about he quickly stepped into action, and was about to radio it in when a call came over the radio that there was a lost child at visitor services. A girl who was picking up litter very kindly took me up there, and there he was colouring in, eyes all red and bloodshot with crying - bless him!

As it happened, as we retraced our steps, Joe must have been concentrating on the new fan around his neck and continued walking up the hill. When he realised he was lost, a mum came up to him and took him to visitor service, and when he got there - bless his heart, he had remembered that David's and mine phone numbers were in his pocket and said to the woman "Please can you ring my mummy and daddy." I'm soooo proud of him for that.

Do you know, he was only missing for four minutes or so, but it felt like an eternity. It wasn't his fault, it was mine, and I will try my darnedest for it to never happen again. So there you are - drama indeed.

And just to put your mind at rest, he we are all reunited. Me, probably with a few more worry lines, and Joe - well I know he does have a peculiar look on his face but he's not traumatised by the ordeal ( I hope!) - I think he was mid blink, as he was jumping all over the place before and after said photograph.

Sorry for waffling - but I think spilling my story has had some sort of cathartic effect for me! I'm off now to get some stuff out of the loft for Ideal World next week - hope it doesn't smell musty!

Thanks for visiting - drop by again soon xx!